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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



ELEMENTARY ETHICS 



l/ BY 

NOAH K. DAVIS, A.M., Ph.D., LL.D. 

Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Virginia 



AN ABRIDGMENT OF THE AUTHOR'S 
ELEMENTS OF ETHICS 



Tptcpovrai trdvres oi dvdpwireioi vbpai inrb ewj rod 
ddov • Kpartei yap to<tovtov 6k6(tov idfkei, /ecu e£ap/c&t 
iracri ko.1 ireptylverat. — Herakleitos 




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PREFACE 



This treatise is intended for readers who feel the need of 
a simple, direct and comprehensive theory of morals. Also 
it is designed to serve as a handbook in institutions for 
higher education, where the subject of ethics is usually 
offered to hearers who, though already well advanced in a 
course of liberal studies, are presumed to have no acquain- 
tance with this branch of philosophy. My experience in 
teaching it has led me to give such pupils primarily a 
rounded scheme, postponing an examination of the various 
and often conflicting views of philosophical moralists. Ac- 
cordingly, in this elementary treatise, I have simply pre- 
sented my preferred theory, starting from a principle, 
proceeding logically in the development of a complete sys- 
tem, and indicating cursorily many practical applications. 

The preparation has been long and diligent. I have 
been in search of truth, glad to receive light from any source, 
and have now summed the results of my reading, thinking 
and teaching for many years in what is here offered to my 
fellow-teachers, hoping it may be suited to their wants, and 
aid them in imparting high ideals and shaping noble char- 
acters. Naturally I am solicitous that my work should 
be well received and approved, but whatever judgment be 

iii 



iv PREFACE 

finally passed upon it, I shall have been conscious of sincere 
desire and earnest endeavor to reach and teach sound doc- 
trine. This task finished, I shall hardly undertake another, 
but rest in the hope that what is now done shall be found 
well done, proving a step toward truth in philosophy, and 
a help toward righteousness in life. 

It has been thought desirable, in order to offer the work 
in available forms, that two editions should be simultane- 
ously issued under slightly varied titles. The text of the 
" Elementary Ethics " is identical with that of the " Ele- 
ments of Ethics ; " but to the latter are added psychological 
and philosophical prolegomena, together with a considerable 
body of marginal notes. As these additions are not at all 
essential to unfolding the theory, they have been omitted 
from the present volume, thereby reducing its cost, yet fur- 
nishing all that is strictly necessary, and as much as can be 
advantageously used in the limited time of many classes of 
students. It is recommended that, while the teacher will 
supply orally whatever is needed for the elucidation of the 
text, the attention of the pupil be directed to the table of 
Contents. This is a logical analysis of the entire work, fur- 
nishing a title to every section. It will greatly aid the 
thoughtful student, both in more clearly apprehending the 
specific points, and in grasping the theory as a comprehensive 

whole. 

NOAH K. DAVIS 

University of Virginia 



COJSTTEWTS 



FIRST PAET — OBLIGATION 

Introduction page 

§ 1. Moral law a reality. Ethics defined 1 

§ 2. Two methods avoided 2 

§ 3. The method adopted in this treatise 3 

I. Rights 

-§ 4. The claim. Contention for private ; for public 5 

§ 5. The task of ethics. A right, how to be treated 6 

§ 6. Conscious life a condition and determinant of 6 

§ 7. Desires the basis. The ethical principle 7 

§ 8. Kinds of rights, reduced to liberty 9 

II. Liberty 

§ 9. Freedom, the power of choosing, a postulate 11 

§ 10. Four constitutional limitations, and corollary 11 

§ 11. Freedom absolute. Liberty discriminated 13 

§ 12. Objective restrictions of liberty 14 

§ 13. Subjective restrictions. Persuasion. Menace 15 

§ 14. Warranted restrictions. Unavoidable. Avoidable .... 16 

III. Trespass 

§ 15. Personal relations determinative of rights 19 

§ 16. A right implies possible interference. A wrong 20 

§ 17. Modified statement of the moral principle 21 

§ 18. Trespass defined. Its wide sense. Limits liberty 22 

§ 19. Practical difficulties. Partial clearances 23 

§ 20. Property rights. Adjudication of 24 

§ 21. The trespass of forced intrusion, of vice, of discourtesy ... 26 

§ 22. Personal honor, its offense and defense 27 

§ 23. Indirect trespass, its parity. Sin is trespass 29 

TV. The Law 

§ 24. Its cognitive origin, and its formula 31 

§ 25. Conscience defined. Inerrant. Uneducable 32 

§ 26. Imperatives. The moral law categorical . 33 

v 



yi CONTENTS 

PAGE 

§ 27. Supremacy of the law. Addressed to the will 34 

§ 28. The law objective in origin and character 35 

§ 29. Negative form. Deductions. Decalogue. Civil law .... 37 

§ 30. This form inadequate. Positive form 39 

V. Sanctions 

§ 31. Consequences ratify and sanctify the law 41 

§ 32. Subjective sanctions. Moral sentiments 42 

§ 33. The natural impulse to reward and punish 43 

§ 34. The subjective objectified, and proportioned 45 

§ 35. Legalized forms of. Reduction to unity 46 

§ 36. Pain a penal ordinance. Not an evil 48 

VI. Right and Wrong 

§ 37. The meaning and extension of the terms 50 

§ 38. Their opposition. Determination of cases 51 

§ 39. Moral quality not outside of volition 52 

§ 40. Moral quality a property of the intention 54 

§ 41. The immediate and the ulterior intention 55 

§ 42. Imputation of moral quality to other activities 57 

§ 43. The moral paradox 59 

VII. Justice 

§ 44. The positive demand of the moral law 62 

§ 45. Definitions. Injustice and trespass identified 63 

§ 46. Corrective and distributive justice 64 

§ 47. Legalized justice. Its basis. Its imperfection 65 

§ 48. Equity, its jural and its general sense 67 

§ 49. Mercy, social, judicial, divine, consists with justice .... 68 

VIII. Duty and Virtue 

§ 50. Duty, meaning of, positive form of 70 

§ 51. Right and duty. Corollaries. Other synonyms 70 

§ 52. Virtuous character, how formed. Virtue defined 71 

§ 53. The cardinal virtues, summed in justice 72 

§ 54. Vice is slavery ; virtue is not liberty 73 

IX. Selfishness 

§ 55. The conscious ego, and the represented ego 75 

§ 56. The so-called love of self, and duty to self 76 

§ 57. That there is any such duty denied 77 

§ 58. Citation and interpretation of examples 78 

§ 59. General characteristics of the doctrine 79 

§ 60. Argument in support of. First part 81 

§ 61. Second part. Conclusion 82 



CONTENTS Vii 

X. Service page 

§ 62. Extension of the notion of duty. Service obligatory .... 85 

§ 63. Illustrative cases. The law restated 86 

§ 64. The dignity of service. Ministry. Heroism 87 

§ 65. Distribution of benefits. Participation in. Modified altruism 89 

§ 66. The using and serving each other as means 90 

§ 67. Stewardship, in holding and using. In defending 91 

§ 68. The law of service objectively insufficient 93 

XI. Charity 

§ 69. Love obligatory. Definition and distinctions 95 

§ 70. Affection can be and is commanded 96 

§ 71. The variations and extension of the obligation 97 

§ 72. The law of loving service. The law of love 98 

§ 73. Progress in moral culture. Irregularity of 99 

§ 74. The law of love, the law of liberty 101 

XII. Welfare 

§ 75. Pleasure not the sole content of welfare 103 

§ 76. Welfare denned. Its imperfect realization 105 

§ 77. Happiness its reflex. Special conditions 107 

§ 78. The summum bonum. Ancient doctrines of 109 

§ 79. Modern doctrines of. The adopted view 110 

XIII. Deity 

§ 80. His existence postulated. Schemes without God 113 

§ 81. His attributes. Anthropomorphic. The supernatural . . . 114 

§ 82. No other ground for complete ethical theory 116 

§ 83. Not the will, but the nature of God, ultimate 117 

§ 84. Solves obligation. Our's Godward. He to us-ward .... 118 



SECOND PART — ORGANIZATION 

Transition 

§ 85. A brief summary of the foregoing doctrine 121 

§ 86. Complex social relations now to be considered 123 

I. The Man 

§ 87. Is a duplex organism. His corporeal organization .... 125 

§ 88. His mental organization. Exemplified in desires 126 

§ 89. What, if alone ; or if in society, without affections .... 127 

§ 90. A solitary unreal. Man hardly without affections 130 

§ 91. Ethical elements discoverable in personal relations only . . . 131 



vm 



CONTENTS 



§ 92. 
§ 93. 
§ 94. 
§ 95. 
§ 96. 
§ 97. 
§ 98. 
§ 99. 
§100. 
§101. 
§102. 
§103. 



104. 
105. 
106. 
107. 
108. 
109. 
110. 
111. 



112. 
113. 

114. 
115. 
116. 
117. 
118. 
119. 
120. 
121. 
122. 



{ 

II. The Family page 

Variety in obligations due to variety in relations 133 

Natural order determines the family 134 

The ideal family. Karely realized 135. 

Its organic order to be upheld. Kestored 135 

Marriage. Five prerequisites considered 136 

Its dissolution. Legal divorce ; limitation of 138 

Unmarried members of society. Their disadvantage . . . 139 

Family members, mutual influence and obligation of . . . 139 

Individuality and personality of the family 140 

Its extended life and obligations 141 

Family property, its ownership and management 142 

Testamentary disposition of. By consent 143 

III. The Community 

A product of pressure. An organism 145 

Obligation of intercourse. Seclusion condemned 146 

The common law of social decorum 147 

Truthfulness a condition. Deception 147 

Promises. Contracts. Common honesty 149 

Minor organisms subordinate to the whole 150 

Division of labor. Its organic and moral effects 151 

Capital and labor. Socialism. A preference 153 



TV. The State 
Its purpose. Its content. Limits of this discussion . 
Forms of government. Its three essential branches . 
The State an organism. Its ethical character . . . 
Its basis the family. Other organic members . . . 
Its individuality and personality wherein manifest . 
Diversity of obligations. Civic virtue, patriotism 
Ground of punishment. Eight and duty of defense . 
The defense of its members and of itself against trespass 
The right to punish is in this defense. Discipline 
Of rebellion, and revolution ; and of defensive war . 
The relations of States. A universal State .... 



155 
156 
157 
159 
160 
161 
162 
163 
165 
166 
167 



V. The Church 

§ 123. Keligion, its definition and division 170 

§ 124. Subject, in all its forms, to ethical principles 171 

§ 125. The Christian Church, incorporating general ethics .... 173 

§ 126. Its rise and resistless progress 174 

§ 127. Elements of its power. Philosophy of its history 175 

§ 128. Its union with the State. Opposed functions 176 

§ 129. The Church Universal. Its ethical essence 178 



ELEMENTARY ETHICS 



FIKST PABT- OBLIGATION 
INTRODUCTION 

§ 1. In looking on the world around and above us, we 
discover, amid an infinite variety of ceaseless changes, a cer- 
tain uniformity established, which, reduced to comprehensive 
expression, is termed the law of gravity. In looking on the 
world within us, we discover, amid its incessant changes, a 
certain uniformity enjoined, which, reduced to comprehen- 
sive expression, is termed the law of morality. The law of 
gravity represents something real, a fixed corporeal order, 
with which we have to do in every waking moment of active 
life, and to which we must constantly adjust the movements 
of our bodies. The law of morality also represents some- 
thing equally real, a required spiritual order, with which we 
constantly have to do, a universal mandate overruling all 
relations between man and man, to which must be adjusted 
every voluntary action and proposed line of conduct. The 
reality of moral law as an inflexible factor in human life, in- 
volved in the essential constitution of human nature, is a 
scientific truth, as undeniable as the law of gravitation, and 
one whose importance surpasses comparison. 

Science has been well denned to be a complement of cogni- 
tions, having, in point of form, the character of logical per- 
fection; in point of matter, the character of real truth. 
More briefly, science is systematized knowledge. There are 

1 



2 OBLIGATION 

a number of sciences which may be distinguished as sciences 
of human nature, Ethics being the chief. Pre-supposing 
and involving more or less knowledge of the others, it as- 
sumes a basis, develops a system, and elaborates principles 
and rules for the conduct of men individually and collec- 
tively. In view of its basis, Ethics is the science of rights ? 
in view of its system, Ethics is the science of obligation. 

§ 2. The hypothesis of evolution has been applied to the 
explanation of ethical phenomena. Evolution, as a doctrine, 
is concerned with sequence in the form of a series, without a 
beginning and without an end. It can neither ascertain the 
primal origin of the series, nor predict its ultimate issue. 
Only a small section of the series is accessible to observation, 
yet it is boldly projected into a prehistoric past, and upon 
this hypothetical history is founded an explanation of present 
phenomena. The speculation is pleasing but hazardous. It 
inquires how morality has come to be, assuming an origin in 
some heterogeneous principle transmuted under the influence 
of environment. But we are rather concerned to know what 
morality is, and purpose to study its phenomena as manifest 
in mankind of to-day and of history. Inquiry into its genesis 
and prehistoric development may well be postponed until at 
least we have a firm hold upon the thing itself. 

There are many moralists who educe their ethical systems 
from the Scriptures. No doubt the light of revelation has 
enabled the Christian philosopher to advance far beyond the 
conceptions of the heathen world; his higher height has 
given him a greatly enlarged horizon. But a science may 
not borrow its essence, nor appeal to authority in support of 
its doctrines. More especially we should not confuse science 
and revelation. These are distinct though concordant means 
of knowledge, the one aspiring to attain truth by its own 
effort, the other condescending to impart from its abundant 



INTRODUCTION 3 

store. If Ethics is to take rank with the philosophical 
sciences, it must have a basis of its own, and build thereon 
its system. Therefore, in the progress of our proposed in- 
vestigation, we shall in no case cite Scripture as warrant or 
as proof, but only for illustration or verification. Still it will 
be encouraging to find the elaborated and the revealed doc- 
trines in accord, and mutually corroborative. 

§ 3. A brief sketch of the ground and the process adopted 
in the present treatise is now in order. 

The basis assumed is human nature. Man has an original, 
native constitution, which, however much it may be distorted, 
disordered and depraved by his perverted free wilfulness, is 
nevertheless traceable amid its ruins. There are certain fun- 
damental and essential features of humanity, which no pro- 
cess of suppression or violation can ever wholly efface. 
There are capacities and faculties whose organic functions in 
their mutual relations, and relatively to their environment, 
are clearly manifest, however enfeebled by misuse, or de- 
formed by abuse. The recognition of these features and 
powers, and a representation of their orderly functioning, is 
an ideal restoration of human nature to its normal condition, 
and to its fitting place in the life of the world. This rehabil- 
itated man we shall call the natural man, and propose to find 
in him, in the native ordering of his being, a safe and suffi- 
cient ground for determining his universal though intricately 
varied obligation. 

Referring to the foregoing definitions of Ethics, we observe 
that a right in one person is correlative to an obligation in 
some other person. A right and an obligation exist only as 
they coexist ; neither can be alone. But rights are logically 
prior ; they condition and originate their corresponding obli- 
gations. For a right, being founded in the nature of its 
possessor, determines that there be a corresponding obliga- 



4 OBLIGATION 

tion ; whereas an obligation cannot be conceived to determine 
a right. Hence we shall take the notion of a right as our 
point of departure for a search into the philosophy of 
morals. 

As already indicated, the matter that constitutes the con- 
tent of Ethics is real truth. In order to become a science, 
its matter must be developed in logical form whose perfection 
is attained through clear, distinct, complete and consistent 
treatment. To approximate this ideal a methodical proce- 
dure is requisite. Beginning with observation, primarily of 
facts of consciousness gathered by introspection or furnished 
by testimony, and secondarily of the behavior of men in 
social relations, present and past, the intellect discovers in 
these phenomena the universally determinative notion of 
inherent rights, native and acquired, and therein discerns a 
formative principle, imperative in character, and constituting 
the common bond of obligation among men. This strictly 
universal and necessary principle is not inductively general- 
ized, but is intuitively discerned. From it deductions are 
then made to subordinate truths, until these, arranged in a 
logical system, shall extend throughout all lines of human 
activity, and comprehend all modes of human obligation. 
Ethics thus constituted is a deductive science. 

In this essay the First Part treats of the source and 
character of Obligation. Its view is confined to the moral 
bond subsisting in the simple relation of man to man in entire 
parity and reciprocity. The Second Part treats of the va- 
rieties of obligation arising from the varieties of relation due 
to the Organization of men into complex associations. 



BIGHTS 



CHAPTER I 

EIGHTS 

§ 4. Every man conceives himself as having certain per- 
sonal rights which he esteems of great worth, and guards 
with jealous care. Throughout life he is chiefly occupied 
with enlarging, confirming and defending them. They are 
a sacred possession which he zealously maintains, and whose 
loss or diminution he regards as degrading his manhood. 
This is one of the most striking and significant facts in the 
historical and current activities of mankind. 

Thence arises much of the strife that continually agitates 
the world. Among barbaric peoples personal violence is 
commonly used to maintain or to recover what one claims 
to be his personal rights. Among civilized peoples courts 
of justice are established to determine the relative rights of 
contending parties, and an executive is empowered to enforce 
their decrees. Nearly all the litigation abounding in every 
nation throughout history is a contention for real or imagi- 
nary rights. 

While each individual man has his own private rights, 
there are many of which he is possessed in common with 
other persons. The maintenance and development of com- 
mon or public rights is committed to organized society, the 
tribe, the state, the nation. When the claims of one on 
another of these conflict or are questioned, diplomacy assumes 
to adjust the rights involved. This failing, recourse is had 
to war. Hence the innumerable battles that mark the tragic 
history of mankind. 



6 OBLIGATION 

§ 5. Evidently the notion of a right, since it is the 
source of snch intense particular and social activity, has 
deep root in human nature. Also it is evident that, through- 
out the contentions to which it gives rise, there is an appeal 
to some common principle or law of widest generality, appli- 
cable to an infinity of cases, and of the highest practical 
importance in the progressive life of humanity. But inas- 
much as this universal and overbearing law is for the most 
part obscurely discerned and imperfectly formulated, it is 
inevitable that men should differ often and widely in its ap- 
plication to particular cases. It is the province of Ethics to 
search out and formulate the law, and to unfold its general 
bearing on the several classes of its subjects. 

To this end let us fix discriminating attention on the no- 
tion of a right. It is an abstract from personal relations, and 
catholic in them. Whenever and wherever two persons 
come into any mutually affective relation whatever, then and 
there come into being reciprocal rights, and consequent obli- 
gations. The abstracted notion of a right, being pure and 
simple, is as to itself incapable of analysis, and hence of 
formal definition. But we may examine its conditions, its 
antitheses, correlatives, and other implications, and thus clear 
the conception, and distinguish it by its invariable environ- 
ment and limitations. This analytical process will disclose 
fundamental and determining elements, fixing clearly the 
scope and bearing of the notion, and evolving the formative 
principle and the law involved in its essence. 

§ 6. Life is obviously a primary condition of any right. 
Only living beings have rights. The notion is incongruous 
to a stock or a stone. Among living beings, those alone can 
be conceived as having rights that are endowed with a con- 
sciousness involving at least volition, its primary element, 
conjoined with some degree of sensibility. A right, then, is 



BIGHTS 7 

a logical property, a mark that belongs to this, and to no 
other class of beings. 

But conscious life is not merely a condition of rights, not 
merely what must be in order that rights may be. There is 
in its very nature that which determines that rights shall be. 
They are of its essence. Thus every conscious being neces- 
sarily has rights by virtue of its ultimate constitution. It is 
not necessary that every one so constituted should be aware 
of the fact, either in detail or in general, not even in the 
most obscure way. But the higher orders of conscious be- 
ings recognize relatively to themselves the existence of rights 
in the lower orders, though these be quite destitute of the 
notion. 

§ 7. Every man has, elemental in his conscious life, cer- 
tain powers of mind, and thence of body. These powers, 
faculties and capacities, belong to his nature, to his original 
constitution, and are essential in his make-up as a man, as a 
human being. They are, more specifically, conditions psycho- 
logically antecedent to the existence and apprehension of 
rights, and rights are the natural and necessary consequence 
of their existence. That is to say, powers and rights are 
natural, constitutional, original correlatives. 

These native powers are distributed as modes of knowing 
and feeling, desiring and willing. The members of the latter 
couple constitute more particularly the practical side of 
human nature, and are intimately concerned with the exist- 
ence and exercise of rights. Therefore on them especially 
we fix our present attention. 

A desire implies an impulse, occasioned by a want, urging 
the will to an activity, relative to other powers, such as 
seems likely to result in gratification. Every one is actuated 
by desires which thus motive his conduct. These sources of 
activity are the determinants of his welfare, and his rights 



8 OBLIGATION 

have in them their ultimate ground. Hence it is only as his 
desires, either actual or potential, are infringed that his rights 
are affected ; and to that for which he has not and cannot 
possibly have a desire, e. g., a villa in the moon, he has not 
and can never possibly have a right. Normal desires, or such 
as have an instinctive rise, and are in accord with the gene- 
ral order of nature, impel toward the fulfillment of the appro- 
priate functions of the man in a world of persons and things. 
This consideration of its terms brings into clear view the 
truth of the principle : A man has a right to gratify his normal 
desires. 

Every volition or act of the will is immediately conditioned 
on desire ; that is to say, no exercise of the will can occur 
except by virtue of an antecedent desire which as a motive 
impels it to action. But notwithstanding this dependence, 
the will is to be regarded as central in the personality, since 
it has the function to control, modify, suppress or arouse the 
activity of all other powers, including even its conditioning 
desires. Freedom consists in the possibility of this voluntary 
exercise of one's powers, and without freedom it is evident 
that their normal functions cannot be fulfilled, or that free- 
dom is necessary to the natural working and development of 
the entire personality in its existing relations. These con- 
siderations bring to light the truth of the principle : A man 
has a right to a free use of his native powers. 

The two statements are not to be taken as distinct princi- 
ples. Together they constitute the mutually dependent and 
complementary parts of the consistent whole -. A man has a 
right to a free use of his native, powers in the gratification of 
his normal desires. 

This principle is the basis of Ethics. It is axiomatic, self- 
evidently true, not needing or admitting any logical proof; 
for the intuitive, synthetic d priori judgment involved in the 
pure notion of a right, finds its immediate application to the 



BIGHTS y 

desires and volitions. At first view it may appear thoroughly 
egoistic or selfish in character, but the outcome of a pa- 
tient and thorough scrutiny of its bearings will reverse 
this primary impression. Likewise its formal universality 
may seem to sanction unbounded license, but the close in- 
spection to which we shall submit it will discover very strin- 
gent limitations, not arbitrarily imposed, but arising from the 
matter of its constituent terms, and leading to a disclosure of 
our varied obligations. Thus there is no need to look be- 
yond the natural and original constitution of man, despite its 
weakness, perversion and distortion, to discern the prolific 
principle of morality. 

§ 8. In view of their objects it is usual to name three 
kinds of rights : the right to life, the right to liberty, the 
right to property. This division appears in the three funda- 
mental verbs : to be, to do, to have. But the species are not 
independent, for each involves the other two as complemen- 
tary correlatives. 

It follows that either two may be regarded as modified 
forms and be expressed in the terms of the third. Thus, for 
instance, life without some measure of liberty in the use of 
instrumentalities, could hardly claim the name. 

Also, life and liberty are commonly spoken of as forms of 
property; as when one says, my life, his liberty. Indeed 
rights in general are viewed as forms of property in the fa- 
miliar phrases, my rights, our rights, their rights. We cor- 
rectly say that every man has rights, he owns them, he is 
their proprietor. Some rights he may dispose of at will, others 
are inalienable except by forfeiture ; but, so long as they in- 
here in him, they are his possession, his own. The sense of 
proprietorship in rights is very strong, as seen in the tena- 
cious retention and persistent defense of them when men- 
aced. 



10 OBLIGATION 

Likewise the several kinds of rights may be reduced to the 
right to liberty. Conscious life is an aggregate of active 
powers, and a power is a possibility of change. A right to 
life is a right to exercise these powers, a right to self-deter- 
mined change, which is liberty. Also property in external 
things means liberty to make use of them. To be dispos- 
sessed of any property is to be deprived of this liberty ; but 
the thing is still one's own, and the right to its free use, 
though suspended, remains. Thus ownership in external 
things is a right to liberty. 

Of these reductions, the last, though least familiar, is most 
clearly real, and of widest and deepest import. Hence, 
while we cannot avoid using the language of possession, we 
shall adhere to the view that every right, in its last analysis, 
is a right to some phase of liberty, to the untrammeled exer- 
cise of ability. Manifestly the cardinal element in the princi- 
ple already formulated is a right to liberty in this general 
sense, and on it our further consideration shall chiefly turn. 






LIBERTY 11 



CHAPTER H 

LIBERTY 

§ 9. Freedom means the absence of causal restraint or 
constraint. It is a function purely negative, yet a special 
subjective property of volition. It is the power of choosing. 
Causative determination is incompatible with the existence 
of choice, for in causation there is no alternative, whereas in 
choice an alternative is essential. The power of choosing 
is simply the ability to decide freely for one act or line of 
conduct rather than for its possible alternate. 

Whether or not there be in reality a power of choice is an 
old and difficult question in metaphysics. Without renew- 
ing its discussion, the point is here made that the reality 
of choice is a necessary condition and hence a postulate of 
Ethics. Whoever is morally responsible must be free. Con- 
sequently we here assume that in all voluntary activity there 
is real freedom in measure sufficient for responsibility. 

§ 10. Certain limitations of freedom need now to be 
observed. Freedom lies in the power of choice, and in it 
alone. All other powers of mind are subject to causation, 
their activities being always definitely determined by causa- 
tive antecedents. That choice alone is free is a simple fact 
in human nature, and a very narrow constitutional limitation 
of our original and originating ability ; but it is the essential 
difference between a creator and the passive work of his 
hands. It renders possible not only moral obligation, but 
also an infinite variety of self-determined activities. 



12 OBLIGATION 

A choice resolved is intention. The intention accords 
with that desire to which preference is given by choice. 
The elected desire, if it be for action, induces a voluntary 
effort whose end is the object desired. This effort consists 
solely in an act of attention. The fixing attention more or 
less intense on a chosen object is the total of possible volun- 
tary energy. We observe here a second very narrow consti- 
tutional limitation of human ability. Still this power of 
attention proves sufficient for the purposes of life, and for 
fulfilling the demand for moral action and conduct, since by 
means of it we are capable, directly or indirectly, of com- 
plete self-mastery. 

Because determined by the free act of choice, freedom is 
attributed to the exercise of attention. This freedom, how- 
ever, is not absolute, but suffers restriction. That the exer- 
cise involves effort, a nisus or striving, shows the presence 
of obstacles within the mind itself. Evidently there is some 
mental inertia to be overcome, which checks and hmits the 
action ; otherwise there would be no occasion for effort, no 
point of application whereon to expend energy. Herein is a 
third limitation. 

Mental effort is a force or cause, free in that according to 
choice it may or may not be put into play, and in that, if put 
into play, its intensity may be varied. Now the mental may 
be transformed into physical energy, and issue in muscular 
action. This, too, is accomplished through attention. To 
move my arm, I must have an idea of the arm and of it as 
moving. Fixing my attention thereon, and willing the reali- 
zation, the arm moves accordingly. This is inexplicable. 
We know it only and simply from experience. But let it be 
observed that the direct control of the animal body lies ex- 
clusively in this power to contract, according to choice, the 
voluntary muscles, a limited class, thus producing motion of 
the limbs and some other organs, while very many vital 



LIBERTY 13 

activities, as pulsation and digestion, are beyond direct con- 
trol. Moreover, when the movable organs are at liberty, 
still the extent of their motion is very closely circumscribed. 
This discovers a fourth very narrow constitutional limitation 
of free action, restricting or confining it to the ability to con- 
tract a muscle, and so to move a member through a small 
space. Still it is much, very much, to possess and to have 
at command a free physical force, free in that it accords with 
choice, which force we may use at will, combining it with 
fixed natural causes, varying its direction and small inten- 
sity, so as to arrest or modify the operations of nature. 

It is a noteworthy corollary that this limitation to loco- 
motion extends to the body as a whole, and to all external 
things. These we move from place to place, but this is the 
total of our direct physical efficiency. The planter moves a 
spade and seed from one place to another ; the forces of na- 
ture do the rest, producing the crop. The smith moves his 
hammer up and down, the weaver throws his shuttle to and 
fro; the outcome is fabricated by virtue of the natural 
forces inherent in the materials. A knowledge of natural 
forces, and an intelligent, purposeful placing of things so as 
to take advantage of them, enable men to manage factories, 
to tunnel Alps, to navigate oceans, to wrap the earth with 
iron, and to cover its face with cities. But in all his infin- 
itely varied works, man has at command only the single free 
physical ability to place or displace things. 

§ 11. Freedom isolates each man from every other, setting 
him apart and alone in the universe. For this center of his 
personality is intangible, out of reach of any other being. 
By the gift of his image the Deity has made man to this 
extent independent of himself, putting it beyond his power 
to cause a human creature willingly to do otherwise than 
that creature may choose ; since therein would be a contra- 



14 OBLIGATION 

diction. He may reason and persuade, command and 
threaten, but cannot causally coerce the man, for this de- 
stroys the essential conditions of personality; the man in 
such case is not a man, not a moral being. Much less may 
a fellow-man causally determine his choice. One may de- 
stroy another's life, but not otherwise his personality. The 
freedom of man, within constitutional limits, is absolute. 

Freedom and liberty are synonymous terms, denoting the 
absence of causal determination. They are commonly used 
interchangeably, but it will be convenient here to use them 
distinctively. Freedom signifies the absence of causal deter- 
mination antecedent to and effective of election and inten- 
tion. It is strictly subjective. Liberty signifies primarily 
the absence of preventive causes subsequent to intention, of 
obstacles, impediments or hindrances that interfere more or 
less effectively with its successful accomplishment. It im- 
plies the untrammeled exercise of voluntary effort in its 
normal function of carrying out the intention. It is objec- 
tive in that it has reference primarily and especially to 
external difficulties. A prisoner is entirely free in preferring 
release to continued confinement; but not until the door 
opens is he at liberty. The term is also applied in this sense 
to purely physical facts ; as, an unscotched wheel is at lib- 
erty ; a spark on powder liberates energy. 

§ 12. The exercise of liberty or free action, in the sense 
just indicated, often suffers restrictions that diminish it, even 
to annihilation. Neglecting impossibilities and impersonal 
difficulties, we shall consider only those restraints that arise 
from the conflict of other wills. 

One person may effectively interfere with the liberty of 
another by using his own muscular force, either directly or 
by setting obstacles to bar the way. The man thus assailed 
may be overpowered by stronger handling, and be fettered or 



LIBERTY 15 

imprisoned. Also he may be beset and embarrassed in his 
taking or keeping possession of property, in producing and 
imparting. Also any withdrawing or withholding of means 
which he might use to attain a chosen end, is an interference 
with his liberty. Such external interferences may occur in 
an infinite variety of ways, and are cases of causal determina- 
tion. 

§ 13. There is, however, a secondary sense, even more im- 
portant and perhaps more frequent, of the use of the term 
liberty, in which it signifies the absence, not merely of causal 
restriction, but also of any inducement presented to one in- 
clining him otherwise than he, if unassailed, would be dis- 
posed. When influences that are not causes are brought to 
bear on a man pressing him to choose otherwise than he 
would, modifying and sometimes reversing his original and 
characteristic preferences, this is properly regarded as a 
restriction of his liberty. 

The process becomes clear upon a little consideration. 
The power of choice is obviously conditioned on cognition. 
There must be an idea of an action, and of its possible alter- 
nate. A judgment is rendered between these, and the choice 
accords with the weightier reason. Reasons are not causes. 
A man may be influenced in his choice by them without loss 
as to his personality, and indeed his every choice is subject 
to rational determination. The reasons for one alternative 
are more influential than those for the other, and he freely, of 
himself, chooses the former. It is not at all requisite that 
the prevailing reasons should be what might be called good 
reasons ; they may be very bad, poor, trifling, or even absurd 
reasons ; nevertheless they are the rational determinants with 
which the choice accords. 

Now, a man may not effect, but he may affect another's 
choice by presenting such reasons as shall operate through 



16 OBLIGATION 

the desires to influence his course. This is done obviously 
by argument; also one obviously influences by persuasion 
the decisions and conduct of his fellows. Even greater in 
extent is the influence of instruction, as in the education of 
children. Indeed, in the whole process of education, we in- 
fluence powerfully the general disposition, character, and 
course through life of other persons, thus putting permanent 
restraints upon their liberty. So also in social and political 
relations, and in religion, restraining influences, or interfer- 
ences with liberty, are constantly exerted by the presentation 
of reasons. 

Another way of embarrassing the will, and so checking 
liberty, is by reason of threatened harm, as seen particularly 
in the penalties of the law. The police, the court and the 
penitentiary offer a constant reason for conformity to law. 
The footpad, who presents the alternative of your money or 
your life, thereby proposes a reason usually sufficient to de- 
termine in favor of yielding the purse. A plea of duress is 
allowed by the courts in discharge of engagement, or in miti- 
gation of penalty. Any menace inspiring apprehension in- 
terferes with liberty, changing the preferable direction of 
action, or diminishing its range, without bringing to naught 
the possible alternative. The weightiest examples of such 
interference are to be found in political oppression, in reli- 
gious persecution, and still more generally in war. 

§ 14. An important distinction now to be made is between 
those interferences, both external and internal, that are war- 
ranted and those that are unwarranted. 

The state warrants its officers in the arrest and imprison- 
ment, and even in the execution of offenders against its laws. 
It warrants the seizure of goods to satisfy judgments, the 
confiscation of private property for public weal, the levying 
of taxes for its own support, the conscription of citizens for 



LIBERTY 17 

military service, the bondage of a class as serfs or slaves. 
Also by stringent enactments it regulates industry in produc- 
tion and trade, restricts marriage and divorce, inheritance 
and bequest, and provides compulsory education. These and 
many other restraints on the original liberties of its subjects 
it imposes, and enforces, if need be, with a strong arm. 
Aside from those enjoined by the state, there are many for- 
mal restraints in the common intercourse of men which are 
warranted by social relations. To these may be added re- 
straints within the family circle, especially those arising from 
the exercise of parental authority. 

The foregoing restrictions of liberty are unavoidable. One 
may approve of and willingly comply with them, but his con- 
sent is not asked ; he can neither refuse to accept them, nor 
escape by renouncing them. But there are also many avoid- 
able restraints that exist by consent, as in contracts, promises, 
marriage, and membership in clubs, societies, institutions and 
churches, whose requisitions are warranted by being legiti- 
mate and voluntarily conceded. 

Very grave questions arise, and will be subsequently con- 
sidered, respecting the ground of the warrant or right to 
bind. It is sufficient here to observe that the occasion and 
extent of warranted interference is determined by the rela- 
tive rights of the parties. Granting the warrant in the vari- 
ous cases cited, it is evident that they represent a large and 
distinct class of restrictions in the range of personal lib- 
erty. 

It seems, then, that every man is surrounded by legitimate 
checks on action, having warrant in the rights of others to 
whom he is personally related. He cannot transgress a cer- 
tain circumscribed bound without infringing on their privi- 
leges, and he is debarred from doing so, as far as practicable, 
by their conflicting wills. Thus by the rights of others 
everyone's rights are limited. But within the limits thus set, 



18 OBLIGATION 

any willful restraint upon one's liberty of action, either exter- 
nal or internal, being ex vi termini unwarranted, is a violation 
of his ultimate constitutional right to a free use of his powers 
in the gratification of his normal desires. On this class of 
interferences we proceed to bestow special consideration. 



TRESPASS 19 



CHAPTER III 

TRESPASS 

§ 15. Having considered certain conditions and limitations 
of rights, we are now prepared to examine more particularly 
the basis and origin of the notion, together with certain 
other conditions, correlates and implications that mark the 
limits of interference in liberty. 

The notion of a right, being pure and simple, is incapable 
of logical definition. Like all other pure notions it is imme- 
diately discerned upon an empirical occasion. The occasion 
for this intuition is the experience of a personal relation. It 
is a matter of common observation that we all stand in vari- 
ous and dissimilar relations to other sentient beings, as of 
man to man in reciprocal parity, of parent to child, of bene- 
factor to beneficiary, of ruler to subject, and many others. 
Now, so soon as a human mind apprehends a relation between 
two persons, whether the observer be one of the parties or 
not, upon that occasion it immediately discerns the concomi- 
tant existence of mutual rights. Their special character and 
extent is not immediately discerned, but only that they exist. 

The character and extent of the rights discerned are de- 
termined by the kind and intimacy of the relation between 
the parties. Whenever we undertake to pass moral judg- 
ment on any action, we examine and reflect upon the rela- 
tion sustained by the persons concerned, and make this the 
basis of the judgment, approving or disapproving, mildly or 
strongly, as the case may be. We judge that a benefactor 
has a right to the gratitude of his rightful beneficiary ; that 



20 OBLIGATION 

a subject has a right to the forbearance of his rightful ruler, 
who, in violating that right, becomes a tyrant. Thus rights 
vary with relations. Those of parent in child are different 
from those of child in parent ; those of benefactor in recipi- 
ent, from those of recipient in benefactor; and both differ 
from those lying in elder and younger brothers, and in master 
and servant. But in all such relations, however they may 
otherwise differ from each other, we see the existence of 
mutual rights, whose character and extent are determinable 
only by, and ascertainable only from, the nature of the rela- 
tion. It is therefore held as an ethical principle that rights 
are conditioned on personal relations, discerned in personal 
relations, and determined by personal relations. 

In attempting to unfold the ethical theory grounded on 
personal relations, we shall confine our attention primarily 
and for the most part to the simple and indifferent relation 
of man to man, in entire equipoise and reciprocity. 

§ 16. A slight attention to the notion of a right discovers 
that it is conditioned on a social relation. A solitary man, 
one absolved from all fellowship, however entire his liberty, 
however abundant the means of gratifying many desires, has 
not, strictly speaking, any rights. Now a right, since it 
exists only by virtue of a personal relation, near or remote, 
implies a liability of conflict between wills ; at the least, the 
conceivable possibility of an interference in one's liberty by 
some other person. For example, a right to go involves the 
notion of possibly being hindered or opposed, not by the 
physical difficulties of the way, but by the counteracting will 
of some other person, which coming into play, the right to 
go is orally claimed, and perhaps violently exercised. Any 
right whatever that any man or people or nation may have, 
is held in view of a conceivable hindrance or obstruction on 
the part of others. 



TRESPASS 21 

Let it be next observed that not every interference in one's 
liberty is an interference in his right. Warranted interfer- 
ence does not violate any right, but only unwarranted inter- 
ference. The notion of a right implies that any intelligent 
interference with its free exercise is unwarranted, which in- 
terference is a wrong. Now a right and a wrong are logical 
antithetical correlatives. The notion of the one necessarily 
carries with it the notion of the other, like as the notions of 
straight and bent, of order and disorder. A wrong, how- 
ever, is conditioned on a right ; that is, a right must be in 
order that a wrong may be. Whenever, then, a person 
knowingly and willingly interferes in my right, checking or 
preventing or making vain my effort to realize it, thereby 
restraining the free course of my powers in seeking to gratify 
my normal desires, he does me a wrong. Thus a wrong is a 
violation of a right, and it again appears that a right can 
exist only in view of its conceivable violation, a possible 
wrong. 

§ 17. The principle that every man has a right to the free 
use of his powers in gratifying his normal desires, may be 
stated thus : Every man has a right to the free use of his 
powers in so far as he does not interfere in the rights of any 
other ; that is, does not violate the right of another, or does 
no one a wrong. We have just seen that the right of either 
party exists only in view of its conceivable violation by the 
other. The modified expression of the principle brings out 
the point that rights in different parties limit each other; 
or that each of two parties has a sphere of rights which 
touches but does not intersect the sphere of the other. 

The necessary and universal limitation expressed in the 
foregoing modified statement of the principle, is merely a 
partial explication of what is implied in the qualifying term 
normal occurring in the prior statement. Normal desires are 



22 OBLIGATION 

those that strictly conform to the natural and original con- 
stitution of man, harmonize with his other powers, and 
accord with his relations to his fellows and to his general 
environment. Those are abnormal which have not this con- 
gruity. Normal desires, as acquisitiveness, are limited to 
such gratification as may be attained without interference in 
the rights of others. Abnormal desires, as covetousness, 
impel to action in disregard of the rights of others. It 
appears, then, that the latter statement of the moral princi- 
ple modifies the former, not in content, but in expanded 
expression only. 

§ 18. In the further treatment of this matter it will be 
convenient to use the word trespass, with some latitude of 
meaning, yet quite definitely. A wrong is any violation of a 
right ; so is a trespass. The terms have identical extension, 
indeed are strictly synonymous. We have found that liberty 
is necessary to the exercise and realization of a right, and 
that a violation of a right is an interference in liberty. Also 
we have found that a warranted interference in liberty is not 
a violation of any right, not a wrong, not a trespass. It re- 
mains, then, that a trespass is an unwarranted interference in 
liberty. 

In legal definition a trespass is an unlawful act committed 
with force and violence, vi et armis, on the person, property, 
or relative rights of another. This narrow, technical state- 
ment is intended to designate those forms of trespass which 
are forbidden by civil law, and have a remedy or a penalty 
therein provided. But in common, free and correct usage 
the term includes many forms of offense of which civil law 
takes no cognizance, indeed any and every act that injures or 
annoys another, that violates any rule of rectitude or bond of 
obligation, and we here adopt this comprehensive meaning. 

Our wide definition gives occasion for another verbal 



TBESPASS 23 

variation in the statement of the moral principle, thus: A 
man has a right to the free use of his powers, provided he 
commit no trespass. On further examination we shall find 
that this provision sets very narrow bounds to rightful lib- 
erty ; indeed that there is no rightful liberty that does not 
conform to the limits and consist with the bonds of morality. 

§ 19. The limit which moral principle puts to the gratifi- 
cation of desire, that it must not involve a trespass on the 
right of any one else, gives rise to many and grave practical 
difficulties. The line between me and my neighbor which 
neither should overstep, is often invisible and intangible. 
To settle it requires, in a numberless variety of cases, very 
thoughtful and careful consideration in which a respect for 
personal right must dominate the greed of personal interest. 
In the intricate, pressing, and ever-changing relations of men 
in society, it is almost impossible to guard and keep intact 
one's own rights, and to avoid a transgression of the bounds 
set by the rights of others. Contentions inevitably abound. 
Thence arise vast and costly systems of judicature among all 
civilized peoples, systems that become more and more intri- 
cate as civilization progresses, involving numerous courts of 
authoritative decision, whose business is little else than to 
mark the bounds of rights, and to enforce the law of trespass 
in its infinitely varied applications. 

The practical difficulties attending questions that concern 
trespass on rights, may be lessened, especially as to our pri- 
vate conduct, by clearing the conception in certain respects. 
To this end the following observations will be helpful. 

Conflicting claims are seen on every hand, but rights 
never conflict. They touch each other, but never overlap. 
They limit by excluding each other, and indeed have no 
other limitation. The same right cannot pertain to different 
persons ; and different rights, however similar, are always 



24 OBLIGATION 

consistent. Wherever there is contention, there is trespass ; 
somebody is doing a wrong ; somebody is interfering in the 
rightful liberty of some one else. Even rights that are 
shared, and so-called common rights, do not and cannot con- 
flict, but are entirely consistent in their exercise. Everybody 
has a right to drive on a public road, but not so as to inter- 
fere in the like liberty of any other. 

Original rights are inalienable in the sense that one cannot 
be unwillingly deprived of them, except by the extinction of 
the objects in which the rights inhere, thus rendering their 
exercise impossible, which is extreme trespass, as in murder, 
arson, and the like. One may be dispossessed of property, 
and otherwise violently limited in liberty, but the right re- 
mains whole, complete, intact so long as its object continues 
to exist. Derived rights or such as have been conferred by 
parental, civil, or other authority, may in many cases be 
withdrawn by resumption of the grant, by confiscation, or by 
exercise of eminent domain. 

Rights in general may be alienated by the possessor him- 
self transferring or forfeiting them. Property rights may be 
transferred by exchange, gift or bequest. Property may be 
alienated also by misdemeanor, the court imposing fines. 
Liberty of person may be forfeited by crime and the criminal 
imprisoned, or all liberty with life extinguished on the gal- 
lows. Being warranted, therein is no trespass. 

§ 20. For more specific illustrations of rights in their sub- 
jection to trespass, we shall now briefly consider the ground 
of property and its patent liability to trespass. Property 
rights are found, in the last analysis, to consist in the origi- 
nal right of every man to the free exercise of his powers in 
the gratification of his normal desires. An infringement on 
them is an interference in this liberty, and so is a trespass. 

Much the larger part of any man's activity consists in 



TBESPASS 25 

appropriating, transforming, and using external objects. 
Natural objects, as land, fruits, ores, to which no one has an 
earlier claim, are withdrawn from the disposal of every other 
person, simply by the taking possession of them. For this 
act of taking possession, inasmuch as it does not involve a 
trespass on any one, is an original right, looking toward the 
gratification of normal desires. Things thus become private 
property, and any hindrance on the part of others to the 
taking possession is a trespass. Moreover, the proprietor 
must be left at liberty to transform his property, by his labor 
and skill, as he wills ; the products arising therefrom being 
likewise his own, to be used freely in further production, or 
otherwise consumed. We shall find hereafter that all prop- 
erty is held in trust, to be used usuriously and consumed 
profitably, else the owner himself becomes a trespasser. 

Many perplexing questions arise in the adjudication of 
property. It may be that an original appropriation is exces- 
sive, more than a fair share, and so a trespass beyond bound, 
but this is very difficult to determine. Moreover, it con- 
stantly happens that there are long pauses in the useful ac- 
tivity of the proprietor of certain material, because of the 
greater or less complexity of his plans, or from lack of con- 
tinuous energy ; still it is evident that during such indefinite 
pause, his right of property must be respected, and the 
material thus reserved be left unmolested for his future use. 
But if, within a time sufficiently great for the ordering of 
all circumstances, he give no sign of making that use, the 
right of property lapses; though it is needful that the inva- 
lidity of the claim be determined and decreed under special 
legal enactment. Finally, it is evident that, while possession 
is proof presumptive of ownership, material may pass from 
the possession of the rightful owner without loss or surrender 
of the ownership; and therefore, while the presumptive 
right of the possessor is to be recognized, it should be super- 
seded by ownership established in action of trover. 



26 OBLIGATION 

§ 21. Setting aside felonies or high crimes, such as murder 
which utterly destroys all rights and liberty, and robbery 
which lessens the means of their exercise, the most familiar 
form of trespass is that kind of injury which is done to a 
man's land or house by intruding into it against his will. It 
is an old legal maxim that eyery man's house is his castle, 
and he is entitled to treat as an enemy any one who attempts 
to enter it without his consent. As to land, the owner is 
not bound to fence it, and whether inclosed or not, a neigh- 
bor is not at liberty to enter on it himself, or to permit his 
cattle so to do. For in all such cases the liberty of the 
owner in the use of his house or field is at least liable to 
infringement, is jeoparded, which is trespass. 

It is perhaps not quite so clear that vice is trespass, yet 
sufficiently clear. Gambling is a transfer of property deter- 
mined by an event whose occurrence is believed by all parties 
to the transfer to be due to chance. Therein is a misuse of 
means, a transfer, without equivalent, of property held in 
trust for beneficial ends. This alone makes gambling or bet- 
ting wrong, even in its lightest forms, when there is no un- 
fairness and when the stake is small. Any disregard of the 
claim of others on a productive use of one's means, restricts 
their privileges, and thus is a trespass. Intemperance, the 
excessive indulgence of an appetite or of any desire, is an 
abuse, a weakening, a degradation of powers, to whose fully 
efficient service others have a rightful claim, and hence it is 
an overstepping the bounds of liberty, a transgression, an 
infringement on the privilege of other persons, a trespass. 
The vice of lying, the hearer having a right to the truth, is 
clearly, even when no further injury appears, a checking or 
perverting of the hearer's privilege. Slander is of like char- 
acter, doubling the trespass in the injury to both hearer and 
subject, and in its grosser forms is a misdemeanor, liable to 
legal action for damages. Much more might be said on the 



TBESPASS 27 

ethics of vice, but it is sufficient here to point out that it is 
essentially trespass. 

A great many actions of trifling consequence, and hence 
usually overlooked, have nevertheless essentially the nature 
of trespass. They differ from crime and vice in degree 
rather than in kind, all having the specific mark of unwar- 
ranted interference in liberty. When I have a right to go 
first, and another, who knows or might know this, steps in 
before me, my right is violated. Even if the attempt is 
thwarted by my stepping more quickly, still the integrity of 
my right, the entirety of my liberty, has suffered. One who 
walks through my garden without leave, or enters my door 
unbidden, violates my right to be private. One who, with- 
out warrant of good reason, intrudes on my conversation 
with some one else, or interrupts my words to himself, breaks 
in upon my right of free speech. When we occupy the time 
or attention of another otherwise than he would, as by send- 
ing a letter or making a visit, we apologize by stating reasons 
that occasion and warrant the call. Any intrusion or inter- 
meddling with what does not concern one, is a trespass. 
When I am in haste, and some one needlessly detains me, it 
is a trespass. Pressing the unwilling for a loan or donation, 
or for an endorsement of any sort, is an embarrassment, a tres- 
pass. Thus in the passing relations of men there are a multi- 
tude of ways in which one may hinder the preferred action 
of another, or turn its direction, thereby, lightly perhaps, yet 
essentially, committing a trespass. The conventional unwrit- 
ten laws of mutual courtesy in social intercourse are regulative 
of private conduct and protective of private personal rights 
from personal trespass. Politeness is morality in trifles. 

§ 22. The foregoing mention of slander suggests a class of 
offenses touching personal dignity that calls for special con- 
sideration. An impolite act or word to a person worthy of 



28 OBLIGATION 

respect is a wrong, inasmuch as it unwarrantably interferes 
in his liberty. In order that one may use his powers freely 
a certain equanimity is necessary, a mental equilibrium. 
This is disturbed by even a slight affront, and he is embar- 
rassed, his liberty of action is checked. Every upright man 
cherishes a certain measure of self-respect, and claims a cor- 
responding degree of respect from his fellows, a respect pro- 
portionate to his estimate of his own dignity or moral worth. 
These constitute his personal honor. It is very precious and 
very sensitive, for no one can fulfill high aims in life unless 
he preserve a calm equipoise of his faculties, and the obser- 
vant deference of his associates. 

If an affront be grave, such as giving the lie or other 
verbal insult, or striking a blow even without physical harm, 
it overthrows for an indefinite time the serene composure, if 
not the entire self-command, requisite to the unbiased exer- 
cise of one's faculties. Such indignity is intolerable. No 
doubt the resentment which arises instinctively often becomes 
excessive, putting into violent commotion the whole being, 
turning it completely away from preferred conduct, and in- 
ducing extreme acts, even such as involve the sacrifice of 
one's life. And indeed in many cases death is better than 
dishonor ; for while death is the loss of all rights, dishonor 
may fix fetters and settle a slavery that is worse than all loss. 

As a man himself defends his life, so he would himself 
defend his honor, his most precious possession, essential to a 
free life. The anger or resentment that naturally follows 
indignation is instinctive impulse to self-defense. It is 
normal, and therefore rightful in rational furtherance. Too 
much cannot be said in favor of the sacred right and obliga- 
tion to defend one's rights, and especially one's personal 
honor. With the savage this passes over into malice and 
revenge, a trespass retaliated by a trespass. But two wrongs 
do not make right; this does not restore the prior state. 



TBESPASS 29 

Among civilized peoples the savagery lingers, particularly in 
the restricted form of dueling, for men are rarely willing to 
submit a question touching personal honor to a civil court 
or to a court of honor. One's honor is a thing too sacred 
to be weighed in the scales, there is no possible counterpoise. 
It is to be personally defended, and in opinions which have 
prevailed, personally avenged. But higher moral culture 
brings its subject to see that he is limited to defense, and to 
that mode of defense which will best prevent the trespass, 
or its repetition, or its imitation. Other remedy is rarely 
possible. It is hard to be angry, and sin not, yet such is the 
moral ideal. 

§ 23. The various kinds of offense to which we have re- 
ferred are mostly modes of direct trespass, wherein an imme- 
diate action unwarrantably checks liberty. Let it be now 
observed and hereafter kept in mind that trespass is very 
often indirect, by mediate action or by inaction. Indirect 
trespass by inaction calls for special remark and emphasis, 
since the term is commonly used only in the positive sense 
of direct action. 

Neglecting to pay a money debt when due is clearly an 
unwarranted interference in the liberty of the creditor ; for 
he might use the money to gratify a normal desire, but is 
restrained and more or less embarrassed by the non-payment. 

In general, any withholding, unless by free consent, of 
what it is one's right to possess is plainly akin to theft, and 
as truly a trespass. A promise of every rightful kind is 
to be kept, because it may have become a factor with the 
promisee in ordering his life, and he may be embarrassed by 
the disappointment of his confidence. A breach of promise 
doing serious injury is a recognized form of trespass, action- 
able at law. Lack of gratitude to a benefactor, omitting a 
meed of praise, failing to show the worthy such outward 



30 OBLIGATION 

marks of respect as are conventional, neglecting to pay or to 
acknowledge any polite attention, these and the like are em- 
barrassing, and hence modes of trespassing. If I am using 
my right of way, it is all one whether somebody else steps in 
the way, or does not step out. In either case he is equally 
in my way. The act committed in the one case and omitted 
in the other, is in each a trespass, a restraint of my liberty, 
and hence the cases are morally identical. 

The notion widely prevails that an indirect trespass, espe- 
cially one omitting to fulfill an obligation, is less offensive 
than a direct trespass committing a deed violative of an obli- 
gation. This is a popular error. In either case, if inten- 
tional, there is a complete breach of obligation, a wrong, a 
trespass. Forgetfulness is more likely to have occurred in 
the former than in the latter case, but forgetfulness, though 
it may palliate, does not wholly excuse an offense. If the 
degree of offense be measured by the gravity of its conse- 
quences, even this will not favor a fault; for it is evident 
that very often a neglect of obligation may be as serious as 
any direct violation. A sentinel who fails to give alarm and 
thus to prevent surprise, is responsible for the disastrous 
consequences, and is condemned to capital punishment. A 
moral distinction between actions omitted and those com- 
mitted is superficial and unessential. 

Sin is transgression of the law of God, disobedience to 
the divine command. We shall hereafter show that any tres- 
pass of man on man is trespass on God, violating his will, 
thwarting his purposes, checking the free course of his de- 
signs. There is also indirect trespass on him in neglecting 
his personal dues, and direct trespass in counteracting his 
ways. All disaccord with him, whether by action or by inac- 
tion, whether by sin of commission or by sin of omission, is 
an unwarranted interference in the divine furtherance of the 
world. Thus it comes to light that all trespass is sin, and 
all sin is trespass. 



THE LAW 31 



CHAPTER IV 

THE LAW 

§ 24. Let intellective attention be again fixed on the 
primary notion of a right. Pure reason immediately dis- 
cerns that a violation of a right, knowingly and willingly 
committed, is a breach of normal order, a violation of law. 
Also it discerns that this law, being violable, is not, like nat- 
ural law, the designation of a constant order of facts that 
have no alternates ; but the designation of an order of facts 
that ought to be constant, an order which, though violable, 
should be inviolate and universal. 

Moreover, pure reason discerns the very important and 
special characteristic of this law, that it is obligatory on the 
potential transgressor. It is addressed to his will, laying 
upon it a binding obligation, obliging him to conform his 
actions to its behests. Accordingly it is recognized as an 
imperative, a command, an order enjoining order on those 
capable of disorder. 

The order herein designated and demanded is a constantly 
observant respect for the rights of others, forbidding any un- 
warranted interference in liberty, forbidding trespass. Its 
formula is: Thou shalt not trespass. This widely yet defi- 
nitely interpreted is the completely comprehensive Moral 
Law, binding all imperfect persons without exception, and at 
all times, in all places, under all circumstances. Thus it is 
both catholic and strictly universal. 

The moral law is independent of experience, except that 
experience must furnish the occasion for its discernment by 
pure intellect. It is not deduced from some higher law; 



32 OBLIGATION 

there is none higher. It does not logically follow from the 
principle of liberty to gratify desire, bnt implies or is implied 
in that principle, and a mere unfolding of the essential con- 
tent of either is all that is requisite for a clear apprehension 
of its truth. Indeed the principle and the law are but 
varied forms of essentially the same necessary truth. As a 
principle, it is an immediate intuition of pure intellect, hav- 
ing the light of truth in itself. As a law, its universally 
binding authority lies in its intuitively imperative truth. 

§ 25. The intuitive cognition of this fundamental, catholic, 
and universal law, is the sole function of the pure practical 
reason or conscience. Conscience is pure reason discerning 
moral law. This faculty has the moral law for its exclusive 
object, and its' exercise is the primary, original, antecedent 
condition of any moral activity whatever, without which lib- 
erty has no moral restraint, and volition no moral character. 

In thus identifying conscience with the pure practical rea- 
son, we give to the term a clear and sharp definition, fitting 
it for scientific use by distinguishing it from those other fac- 
ulties which, subordinately and occasionally, are concerned 
with moral matter, and whose exercise on such matter is 
quite commonly and confusedly spoken of as the exercise of 
conscience. Except the pure practical reason, there is no 
original, distinct, special moral faculty in the human mind. 

Let it be remarked that conscience, as herein defined, can- 
not err. The criterion of a pure intuition is its necessity and 
universality. Conscience in its intuitive discernment discov- 
ers what is necessarily and universally true, and this discern- 
ment, being intuitive, is infallible. It is not, however, itself 
a complete guide of conduct. It must be supplemented by 
the logical function of intelligence, by thought, deducing 
minor rules or the moral quality of particular actions. 
Thought may err, is peculiarly liable to error. Herein is 



THE LAW 33 

the explanation of the great diversity of moral judgments 
among men. The data of pure reason are the same in all 
human minds ; but the judgments formed in the application 
of these data often greatly differ, because of illogical think- 
ing. The liability to error is greatly increased by a common 
acceptance of traditional moral standards, expressed in ready- 
made rules, which, if not themselves erroneous, are often im- 
perfectly comprehended and applied to cases beyond their 
scope. Thus certain individuals, or large classes of men, or 
nations, are said to have high or low standards of morality 
according to the degree of approach and logical conformity 
of these standards to the intuition of pure reason. 

The moral intuition, like all others, may be cleared by dis- 
criminating attention to its occasions, abstracting from the 
empirical elements, and fixing upon the pure; and further, 
by distinguishing those abstract notions with which it is lia- 
ble to be confused, as, for example, utility. In this manner 
only is conscience capable of improvement, of education. 
The accuracy and acumen of the logical faculty, by which 
the moral quality of an action is inferred, may be greatly im- 
proved by intelligent exercise, and thus furnish means for 
the refinement of moral character. The moral sentiments 
may be intensified and the moral impulse strengthened by 
indulgent activity, and the will may become more and more 
submissive to its law by habitual observance. Conscience, 
in its loose general meaning, has these several sources of cul- 
ture ; but in the narrow scientific sense here adopted, it is 
capable only of clearance. 

§ 26. Turning from the faculty by which the law is cog- 
nized to the law itself, we observe that this imperative truth 
is categorical. 

There are two classes of hypothetical imperatives, each 
implying the practical necessity of a means to an end. The 



34 OBLIGATION 

condition in the first of these classes is problematical, being, 
though constant, not universal, but merely possible. Exam- 
ples are found in the technical rules of art. If one would 
build a house, he must gather materials, employ skilled labor, 
etc. The condition in the second class is assertorial, being 
actual, constant and universal. Examples are found in the 
dictates of prudence. If one would be healthy, he must be 
temperate. More generally: If one would be happy, he 
must, etc. These rules and dictates command conditionally. 
There is no necessity that any one should observe them, ex- 
cept in case of his willing the antecedent, which, however, 
in the second class, every one actually does. 

But the moral law is a categorical imperative, command- 
ing unconditionally. It is simply, Thou shalt, or Thou shalt 
not. There is no hypothetical antecedent expressive of a 
definite end to be attained. Moreover, its behest is in disre- 
gard of any special consequences, except in so far as these 
may enlighten the obligation. Tradition and custom may 
likewise illustrate its application, but they neither add to nor 
take from its authoritative hoc age. Its authority is in its 
irrefragable and universal truth, and its truth is in the essen- 
tial and ultimate nature of the facts. It demands an uncon- 
ditional and immediate obedience as a moral necessity, always 
and everywhere, amid any and every combination of circum- 
stances; a blind obedience, if in the dark; an intelligent 
obedience, if there be light; but always an uncompromising, 
unswerving obedience. 

§ 27. The law is sovereign, subjecting all personal powers. 
Each faculty operates according to its own constitutional 
function, but it is not competent for its own guidance. All 
others are dependent on intelligence as a guide, and for the 
full and correct performance of this specific guiding function, 
intelligence is dependent on conscience discerning the law of 



THE LAW 35 

conduct. All human activities, whether they issue in exter- 
nal expression or not, are thus subjected ultimately to the 
moral law. 

It is the peculiar, the exclusive function of the will to con- 
trol all other powers, to bring them into normal and harmo- 
nious exercise. The sovereign law is therefore addressed to 
the will, the executive. It commands choice to conform to 
its behest. It demands the regulation of all inner activity, 
and thus the regulation of all outward action. It is the 
essential informing element in all mandates and minor rules 
of conduct ; the hypothetical imperatives, described above as 
logically coordinate, being ethically subordinate, subject to 
its regulation. Even conscience itself is subject to its au- 
thority ; the law, dimly seen, demanding the voluntary atten- 
tion requisite to its being clearly seen in the fullness of its 
meaning, lest it be ignorantly violated. 

This claim of supremacy, demanding the unconditional 
subjection of the entire will, is more or less clearly recog- 
nized by every one. I see that it is law for me ; I cannot 
ignore or reject its claim. Yet a will often disregards or 
rebels against this authority ; and only when completely sub- 
missive and perfectly accordant can a will be pronounced 
morally good. For " nothing can possibly be conceived in 
the world, or even out of it, which can be called good with- 
out qualification except a good will." 

§ 28. It has already been indicated that rights are grounded 
on personal relations, and that a discernment of the existence 
of rights takes place on an empirical occasion, on an obser- 
vation of such relation in actual life, whether the observer be 
a party or not. Now it is evident that personal relations 
are strictly objective, and rights objectively determined ; hence 
it follows that the moral law, being essentially implied in 
really existent rights, is objective in origin and character. 



36 OBLIGATION 

It is true that human rights are more remotely grounded in 
human nature, and men are spoken of as doing by nature 
the things of the law, as being a law unto themselves, as 
having the law written in their hearts. But this does not 
make the law in any measure or sense subjective. For man 
has a fixed, native constitution of both body and mind ; he 
cannot make one hair of his head white or black, nor can he 
add to or take from his natural faculties, one of which is con- 
science, the eye reading the law written for him in his heart. 
This constitution, being independent of his subjective states, 
is as truly objective as is the solar system, and it is this 
objective constitution, acting in conformity with the existing 
constitution of nature at large, that is determinative of rights, 
of obligation, of the law. 

Thus the moral law is, as to its origin, objective in the 
constituent order of the world. It does not originate within 
me, but beyond me. It is not given by me, but to me. It 
comes to me from without ; it is adventitious. The law of 
causation, every event is caused, and the law of conduct, 
thou shalt not trespass, though the one be indicative, the 
other imperative, the one inviolable, the other violable, are 
alike in this, that each is independent of the mind apprehend- 
ing it. Conscience is not autonomous, nor is the will. The 
law, objectively determined, is read by conscience, interpreted 
by the judicial faculty, and executed, under the moral im- 
pulse, by the will. 

The objective character of the moral law is indicated by 
its independence of circumstances and its disregard of conse- 
quences. Yet still more clearly is this character evidenced 
in its sameness for all classes and conditions of men. Were 
its character subjective, or were it liable to any subjective 
modification, there might be as many variations of the law 
as there are minds of men. But, being one and the same for 
all individual minds, evidently it is not enacted by them, but 



THE LAW 37 

enacted for them. Also, since it is not at all affected by 
what one may think about it, every sane man being accused 
or excused by his fellowmen in disregard of his peculiar no- 
tions, it is clear that a law thus common and unalterable by 
any subjective treatment has the essential character of an 
objective reality. 

§ 29. The law, in the form we have given, is negative : 
Thou shalt not. In this form, taken strictly, it forbids a 
large class of actions without enjoining any. Unquestionably 
this is its primary and most palpable aspect comprehending 
our most obvious obligations, the one most clearly and fully 
recognized in actual life. As prohibitory, it strikes the most 
uncultured intellect, is patent to the grossest comprehension, 
and impresses itself on the humblest capacity, making its ap- 
pearance in the very awakening of the moral consciousness. 
This strictly negative or prohibitory aspect of the law is 
therefore worthy of specific consideration in this place, re- 
serving for subsequent examination its positive forms. 

From the law in its prohibitory form many deductions can 
be made to secondary laws, having less yet very wide gen- 
erality, and retaining the character of strict universality. 
For example: Trespass is forbidden; Murder is trespass; 
therefore Murder is forbidden. In this simple syllogism, the 
major premise is an indicative form of the law intuitively 
true; only the minor premise needs support, which the 
slightest reflection furnishes; for the right to continue in 
life is the highest of rights, it being the condition of all 
others, and to kill unwarrantably, which is murder, is the 
greatest possible trespass, since it extinguishes all liberty, all 
possible enjoyment of any right. Maiming is likewise tres- 
pass, for it diminishes one's liberty to realize his rights ; and 
therefore it is forbidden. Cruelty is pain-giving trespass; 
a wrong, not simply because it gives pain, but because 



38 OBLIGATION 

it thereby unwarrantably interferes in liberty; it there- 
fore is forbidden. Theft is trespass, a violation of the 
right of property preventing its free use; and therefore, 
Thou shalt not steal. These are very obvious yet typical 
cases. 

The Decalogue, which the foregoing suggests, is usually 
spoken of as the moral law. It is eminently, but not ulti- 
mately. Its ten-fold statement lacks the unity requisite to a 
philosophic reduction. Yet it is easily seen that each of the 
ten laws is a simple deduction from the one ultimate law : 
Trespass not. This is the basis. Consequently they are 
throughout negative, simply prohibitory. Let us add the 
observations, that these prohibitions are, in general, progres- 
sive from higher to lower offenses, and that all are objective, 
forbidding outward acts, except the last which is subjective, 
entering the mind or soul, and forbidding unrighteous desires. 

The Ten Words are inadequate. A man may keep them 
all from his youth up, and yet lack. They are directed 
solely against sins of commission. They prohihit certain 
prominent offenses, but posit no explicit obligation of benev- 
olence, no duty of love to God or neighbor. They were 
addressed originally to a people rude, uncultured, whose 
moral character was very imperfectly developed by its Egyp- 
tian experiences. They were for the time as much as could 
be borne. Had the law in its fullness been at once revealed, 
it probably would not have been understood, much less ap- 
preciated, accepted and practiced. In general, the Old Tes- 
tament morality is negative and prohibitory. 

Civil law, under which phrase we include all laws rec- 
ognized, enacted and enforced by an organized State, is 
originally negative in its forms. Even after being greatly 
expanded, it is still very largely negative in expression and 
prohibitory in character. Especially is this true of the crim- 
inal code, which consists of a series of prohibitions of certain 



THE LAW 39 

overt acts. As a science of human rights, civil law is occu- 
pied with classifying and denning the various rights of indi- 
viduals, of corporations, and of communities in general. As 
an art of social regulation, it provides for the adjudication of 
particular cases, and the enforcement of judicial decrees. 
Throughout it is a system of enactments deduced from the 
universal and exhaustive law of trespass, which enactments 
are used as major premises in further deduction ; the minor 
premises being the particular cases which the court is con- 
sidering. Hence it is evident that, in essence, there are not 
many laws ; there is only one law. 

§ 30. The law in its primarily negative sense, forbidding 
certain actions and requiring none, tends to isolate men, to 
set them apart from each other, to sever their natural rela- 
tions. It says : Let your neighbor be,' do not interfere in his 
liberty, do not step in his way or on his ground, respect his 
rights. Accordingly, even among highly cultured people, 
there are many who, while rigidly conforming their lives to 
the prohibitions of the law, apparently have no wider concep- 
tion of obligation, and know no difference between legality 
and morality. Indeed there are some who regard the laws of 
the State, with all their manifest imperfections and narrow 
inadequacy, as marking the bounds of obligation, and con- 
sider it right to claim or do whatever civil law does not 
forbid, all unforbidden actions being permissible and super- 
erogatory. 

A thorough analysis, however, of the conditions and impli- 
cations of trespass, such as we shall subsequently undertake, 
discovers that the limitation to prohibition is inadmissible, 
that it is far from exhausting the moral principle, that there 
is a positive aspect of this formally negative imperative, that 
the injunction placed upon trespass by the universal moral 
law is both a prohibition and a requisition, forbidding to do 



40 OBLIGATION 

this but equally requiring to do that, and embracing all par- 
ticular acts and general conduct. The morality of the New 
Testament advances to this higher positive plane. It does 
not abrogate the earlier form of the law, but arises from it, de- 
mands active benevolence, and so exhausts the obligation of 
man to man. The influence of this positive presentation of 
the law effectively counteracts the isolating tendency of the 
exclusively negative view, restores and strengthens the mu- 
tual relations of men, bringing them into fraternal fellow- 
ship, and uniting them by common and indissoluble bonds. 



SANCTIONS 41 



CHAPTER V 

SANCTIONS 

§ 31. The human will originates actions in the sense that 
it elects one rather than another possibility, and does that 
instead of this. It is therefore rightly regarded as the first 
cause in a series of events whose subsequent members are its 
effects or consequences. As this mastery of the will is itself 
subject to the moral law, the causes and effects in the series 
are qualified as moral causes and effects. But let it be ob- 
served that causation in the mental or spiritual sphere is 
still causation, and in that sphere moral causes determine 
their effects as rigidly as, in the physical sphere, physical 
causes determine their effects. Moreover, such is the recip- 
rocal relation between the spiritual and material spheres 
that an activity in either may be the cause of an event in 
the other. 

When a voluntary act takes place, I have determined it 
shall be this rather than some other. Until then the deed 
is merely potential, I am master, I have to do with it. When 
it becomes actual, then no longer have I to do with it, but it 
has to do with me. I cease to be the actor, and become an. 
observer, perhaps a sufferer. What is done can never be 
undone. There may be counteraction, readjustment, restitu- 
tion, compensation, but there is no restoration or erasure of 
the past. The act is unchangeable. It has passed from 
the domain of moral law and entered the realm of natural 
law, to become a first link in an irrefragable chain of causes 
and effects involving my welfare, perhaps completely and 
inextricably. Often a word unspoken is a sword sheathed at 



42 OBLIGATION 

my belt; spoken, it is a drawn sword in the hand of my 
enemy. 

Experience in such matter brings reflection, and with it 
the wider observation and induction that conformity of voli- 
tion to moral law is wholesome, non-conformity perilous, per- 
haps fatal. These good and evil effects constitute in general 
the sanctions of the moral law, they conserve its sanctity, 
ratifying and vindicating its authority, inducing obedience, 
that it may be unbroken, whole, holy, sacred in the eyes of 
its subjects. 

§ 32. Mandatory law has necessarily penalty affixed. In- 
deed the notion of the one seems to imply the other as of its 
essence ; for the voice of command without power enforcing 
it would be mere brutum fulmen, vox et prceterea nihil. Ac- 
cordingly, in considering the moral order of the world, the 
order that ought to be, we find that any deviation carries 
with it penalty, or rather penalties, as its natural and neces- 
sary consequence. Let us now examine first those that are 
wholly subjective. 

Subordinate to reverence for the law revealed by conscience 
is the sentiment of approbation or of disapprobation, correla- 
tive to the moral judgment approving or disapproving. These 
innate sentiments bear powerfully upon conduct, and thus 
constitute sanctions. Indeed they are the original, constitu- 
tional, and primary sanctions of the law. In the pleasure or 
pain, by which they are strongly marked, we discover native, 
subjective reward and punishment. 

The moral sentiments are so highly influential that their 
function is often exaggerated, and they are supposed to be 
sanctions in the sense of being a sure index and an authori- 
tative exponent of the true moral character of an act or of 
general conduct. Many a man of high culture will assert his 
rectitude in a certain case because he experiences the pleasing 



SANCTIONS 43 

sentiment of self -approbation, saying: My conscience sanc- 
tions my course. It is therefore important to remark that 
one's feelings in view of his actions do not, even in the most 
remote way, furnish any proof of their true moral character. 
This would invert the psychological order that posits moral 
sentiment as dependent on moral judgment. In reality the 
feeling of approbation or disapprobation attends a false moral 
judgment as readily and fully as it does a true one, having 
no power to discern the difference. Hence these sentiments 
do not at all confirm the judgment; but, on the contrary, 
their own justification is wholly dependent on the validity of 
the antecedent judgment ; and this depends ultimately on a 
clear discernment of the moral law by conscience. Accord- 
ingly we observe that even these sanctions, though original 
and innate, are liable, as are all other human sanctions, to 
distribute reward and punishment unduly, both in kind and 
degree. 

In the class of subjective sanctions must be included the 
silent approval or censure of one's fellows. We are largely 
dependent for our free welfare on even the private opinions 
of each other. No man can reasonably be indifferent to the 
judgment that others form of his conduct, and to the moral 
sentiments with which it inspires them. Every right-minded 
man feels this keenly, whether the judgment be just or un- 
just. He is elated and encouraged by silent commendation ; 
he is depressed and discouraged by condemnation. These 
also are potent sanctions ratifying the moral law, and uphold- 
ing its authority. 

§ 33. From the foregoing considerations it appears that 
the notion of violable law carries with it the notions of a gain 
of worth or dignity in its observance, and of a loss of worth 
or dignity in its violation ; also that the one implies the no- 
tion of merit or desert, of reward due, the other of demerit, 



44 OBLIGATION 

of penalty due. Furthermore, an observation of meritorious 
conduct, especially if despite adverse temptation, excites an 
impulse to bestow reward; of culpable conduct, a disposi- 
tion to inflict punishment. These natural impulses have, 
no doubt, an instinctive origin and play, and so far are con- 
stitutional ; but they have also a distinctively rational exer- 
cise, and so far are susceptible of justification. 

In view of one's own conduct, an approving judgment 
of merit excites the instinctive impulse to reward well- 
doing, realized perhaps in some special self-indulgence; 
whereas a judgment of demerit incites an instinctive anticipa- 
tion of punishment, which sometimes is self-inflicted. Crim- 
inals not infrequently surrender themselves voluntarily to 
public justice, that they themselves may have the satisfaction 
of penance for their misdeeds. Suicide following remorse 
has perhaps often the character of self-inflicted punishment. 

Recompense and retribution are reasonable. It is patent 
to common sense that the welfare of a community as a whole, 
and of its several members, is favored by the steady observ- 
ance of the law which requires each to respect the rights of 
all others ; and more especially is it evident that a wrong 
done, a trespass committed, is a breach of order affecting un- 
favorably, not merely the immediate sufferer, but mediately 
the welfare of all, even of those whose relation to him is 
remote. Therefore, when a breach is threatened, all agree 
that preventive restraints should be imposed ; and when a 
breach is actually made, that the offender should be punished 
in such manner and measure as will deter him from repeating 
the offense, and deter all observers from like misdeed. If 
the community be one of which I am a member, I am dis- 
posed and indeed bound to take part directly or indirectly in 
inflicting the deterrent penalty. On the other hand, if some 
one, who, from moral weakness or from lack of moral culture, 
is specially liable to temptation, conform manfully in a cer- 



SANCTIONS 45 

tain action or m general conduct to the social order that 
ought to be, then there is a common judgment that he should 
be rewarded, and a prompting to bestow reward in such man- 
ner and measure as shall strengthen his good will, and induce 
observers in his class to practice like conduct. This seems 
to be a reasonable account and justification of the common 
disposition of men in their treatment of orderly and disor- 
derly persons. 

§ 34. The subjective sanctions in the minds of observers 
tend to become also objective in public opinion. The judg- 
ment and sentiment usually find expression in outspoken 
words of praise or blame, often in modes more forcible, as 
popular honors, or social ostracism. 

Reprobation of a wrongdoer is, in general, directly pro- 
portioned to his intelligence and culture. For it is evident, 
from the admitted supremacy of the moral law, that a knowl- 
edge of one's obligations, implying the possibility of fulfilling 
them, diminishes in so far the ground of apologetic defense. 
Conversely, ignorance of facts and circumstances which go to 
determine the moral quality of conduct, is allowed to be a 
palliation of offense, followed by a mitigation of punishment ; 
yet is not allowed as complete excuse, for no human mind 
can be absolutely blind to its obligations. 

The sentiment and impulse prompting us to reward one 
who does well is, speaking generally, in inverse proportion to 
his intelligence and culture. A street gamin who finds and 
restores my lost purse should have some portion of its con- 
tent bestowed on him, but I would not offer to reward a 
gentleman ; should I commit the blunder, he would be justly 
indignant. We heartily approve the good deeds of cultured 
persons, but express rewards are rarely proposed to them. 
Academic honors are offered to youth as a stimulus before 
the fact, but in mature life honors are indefinite, spontaneous, 



46 OBLIGATION 

and come after the fact. Titles of nobility are usually 
granted as rewards only for some special and signal service. 
Neither these, nor honorable distinctions of any kind, nor 
any emoluments, are granted for mere conformity to law. 
In the civil code, while to each law is attached a penalty 
for its violation, to no law in any enlightened State is at- 
tached a reward for its observance. 

This last observation gives occasion to remark that while, 
as already stated, penalty is a necessary sanction, essential 
in the very notion of violable law, reward is only a contin- 
gent sanction, it may or may not be applied, it is not essen- 
tial. Moreover, in the progress of moral culture, not only 
does a promise of reward, but also the threat of punishment, 
gradually lose its influence. Many a man reaches the stage 
where these are, for himself, lost to view, and he fulfills his 
obligations without regard to either. This is a high, yet 
not the highest, degree of culture. 

§ 35. Another class of sanctions, originating in the fore- 
going, may be discriminated as distinctly objective, being 
embodied in formal ordinance, and having reference to overt 
misdeeds. They are the enactments of an organized State. 
No longer recognized as individual judgments, they super- 
sede the private opinion of the offender, the court and the 
executive, they have passed beyond the more or less sym- 
pathetic opinion of the public, and are objectified in a bind- 
ing penal code. 

Such, in general, is the character of all civil law. It 
cannot be too strongly or repeatedly emphasized that the 
whole science and practice of jurisprudence, in all its various 
branches, together with the vast and complex system of 
courts of judicature, having a prescribed and established 
form, manner and order for conducting suits and prosecu- 
tions, and having executive powers, has its ultimate basis 



SANCTIONS 47 

and justification in the ethical principle of a personal right, 
and is merely an authoritative explication and application of 
the one moral law : Thou shalt not trespass. 

Very many kinds of enacted sanctions of law have been 
devised. There can be no doubt that in the early stages of 
organized society, the spirit of personal vengeance dominat- 
ing, the intent and form of legal punishment was largely 
retaliatory, a paying back blow for blow. This barbarous, 
strict lex talionis is no longer in vogue. It has been ex- 
punged from the penal code of civilized States, excepting in 
case of life for life, which is justified on grounds other than 
vengeance. For it is evident that, if requital in kind, to 
satisfy the thirst for revenge, be the object of punitive 
measures, then it is the purpose of the State, as far as it 
can reach, to double the suffering of its members ; which is 
absurd. Whatever of vengeance is compatible with legal 
punishment, is reserved expressly for a tribunal higher than 
the State. 

Under a prior topic it was stated that rights may be re- 
duced to three, a right to life, a right to liberty, and a right 
to property. In refined codes the penalties correspond, con- 
sisting exclusively in deprivation of life, or of liberty by 
imprisonment, or of property by fines, damages or confisca- 
tion. Flogging has been generally abolished. Restitution, 
or else compensation, is enforced when practicable, but is 
not punishment; hence damages are added. Punishment, 
then, is practically the taking away of that the right to which 
has been forfeited by trespass, by a transgression of the bounds 
set by personal relations to personal liberty. Moreover it 
was pointed out that the three kinds of rights may be re- 
duced to one, the right to liberty in the gratification of nor- 
mal desires. Hence it appears that as all offenses are 
unwarranted interferences in liberty, so all legitimate pen- 
alties are warranted interferences in liberty. 



48 OBLIGATION 

§ 36. Pain is the correlate of restrained or constrained 
energy. Each of our powers tends spontaneously, that is, 
of its own proper nature, without strain, to put forth a defi- 
nite quantity of free activity. If this amount be realized, 
there is pleasure ; if less, the energy being repressed, or if 
more, the energy being overwrought, there is pain. Thus 
all pleasure arises from the free natural play of our faculties ; 
all pain, from their restraint or constraint. The normal is 
pleasurable, the abnormal painful. 

Naturally we have an inclination to pleasure, and an aver- 
sion to pain. A desire for pain, simply for its own sake, is 
a psychological impossibility. This constitutional aversion 
to pain impells one constantly away from abnormal extremes 
toward an intermediate normal condition, while the co-operat- 
ing constitutional inclination to pleasure constantly draws 
one, like a pendulum, toward the same golden mean of mod- 
eration and harmonious order. 

All trespass, being an interference in natural spontaneous 
liberty of action, gives pain. All legal penalty, for the same 
reason, is the infliction of pain ; rarely in like manner, but 
always, if adequate, graduated to correspond in measure with 
the degree of trespass, and limited to the pain of repression. 
More widely, all sanctions of the moral law, innate or enacted, 
natural or artificial, are essentially the same, depending for 
their efficacy on the same element ; all rewards are pleasures, 
all punishments pains. These are the natural attraction and 
repulsion in the spiritual sphere, tending to maintain a uni- 
versal equilibrium, and to restore it when disturbed. 

It was a mooted question among the ancients whether pain 
is an evil, and to-day it is still a question. When we con- 
sider its influence in the preservation of our powers of body 
and mind, averting the ruinous effects of excess on the one 
hand, and of inaction on the other; when we observe the 
working of the whip of pain in the world of sentient beings, 



SANCTIONS 49 

tending constantly to harmonize their mutual interests, and 
adjust their actual relations to the moral order of the uni- 
verse in " a stream of tendency that makes for righteous- 
ness ; " it seems not merely unreasonable to account pain an 
evil, but that it should be reckoned essential to welfare, 
reckoned, along with the highest good, essential in the well 
ordering of a world of free activity. 

This is the sanction by which the Divine Ruler of the Uni- 
verse upholds his government against trespass. We instinct- 
ively revolt at the thought that the Deity is the author of 
sin, the source and sum of evil. But that he is the author 
of pain cannot be doubted, and is entirely accordant with 
the infinite benevolence that proposes and actively seeks to 
accomplish the highest welfare of humanity. 



50 OBLIGATION 



CHAPTER VI 

RIGHT AND WRONG 

§ 37. The substantive notions of a right and a wrong, used 
hitherto, need now to be supplemented by the corresponding 
qualifying notions of right and wrong. 

A right is accorded in law; right is according to law. 
Right lines are straight lines ; we draw them by means of a 
rule or ruler. So in the ethical sense, right actions are such 
as conform to rules of conduct, implying a ruler. More 
generally, they are those conforming to the moral law, any 
deviation from strict rectitude being wrong. 

The terms a right and right are, in last analysis, coexten- 
sive. Whatever one has a right to do is right for him to do. 
This seems obvious. Yet it is commonly supposed that ex- 
ceptions often occur, and even moralists have taught that a 
man may have a right to do what is not right. A planter, it 
is said, has a right to destroy his crop, but it would not be 
right. This paradox cannot be allowed. It arises perhaps 
from the false notion that one has a moral right to do what- 
ever is not forbidden by civil law, which is mere legality, not 
morality. The true limitations of rights are not found in 
civil law, nor in enactments of any sort, but in the nature 
and relations of men, which the most elaborate enactments 
fall far short of denning completely. A producer destroying 
a product of any value, an heir wasting his inheritance, an 
idler not exercising his ability, is wronging or trespassing on 
rights of others naturally vested in these things. In the 
proper ethical sense a right to do a wrong, or to do wrong, 
is absurd. 



EIGHT AND WRONG 51 

Conversely, whatever is right for one to do he has a right 
to do ; any interference by any other is a trespass. For, if 
it be not right, it is wrong, these being contradictories ; and 
in doing wrong one always inflicts a wrong, greater or less, 
near or remote, on some one affected by his act which, if not 
punishable, is at least censurable. Hence the terms are co- 
extensive. 

A moral right, or simply a right should be distinguished 
from a legal or jural right. The one is generic, the other 
specific. The one is accorded in universal moral law, the 
other is accorded in imperfect and exceptional civil law. 
A right properly implies both exemption from legitimate 
interference in its exercise and an obligation to exercise 
it ; whereas a jural right implies immunity merely, not obli- 
gation. Hence the unqualified term leads to confusion. 
Sometimes indeed there is formal opposition between moral 
and legal rights, for occasionally unrighteous laws are enacted, 
technically conferring rights that are immoral, authorizing 
wrongs. A moral right to act is an obligation to act, which 
is synonymous with right action. 

§ 38. Right or wrong is the moral quality of a voluntary 
personal action. As propositions are always either true or 
false, so actions are always either right or wrong. A true 
proposition accords with axiomatic logical principle, and a 
right action accords with axiomatic moral principle. As one 
of two contradictory propositions must be false or logically 
absurd, so one of two incompatible actions must be wrong or 
morally absurd. An action that is wrong is a moral self- 
contradiction, inconsistent with what may be known to be 
right or in accord with axiomatic law, and thus is a self- 
condemned absurdity. 

It has already been stated that on the empirical occasion 
of a voluntary personal action, we have an intuitive discern- 



52 OBLIGATION 

ment by conscience of the existence in it of moral quality, 
we discern that it is either right or wrong. But whether 
the observed action, as striking a blow, be right or be wrong, 
is not at all intuitive, not at all discerned immediately by the 
pure practical reason or conscience. Which one of these 
two contrary qualities it has, conscience does not know; it 
knows only that it must have one or the other. 

For evidently the notions of right and wrong imply ac- 
cord and discord with some general principle requiring all 
voluntary activity or personal conduct to conform uniformly 
to its indications. Hence every case must be subsumed 
under that principle in order to ascertain which one of the 
two qualities is predicable of it. This is a logical process. 
It is not a discernment of pure reason, but is a reasoning ; 
not conscience, but inference. 

The logical process concluding the moral quality in a given 
case, is very liable to error. ' The specific action in which 
the moral quality inheres is, as we shall immediately show, 
subjective, internal in the agent. Now, when one judges 
his own act, though it is open to his direct observation by 
introspective self-examination, still, from a lack of clear dis- 
cernment of the primary principle, or from a lack of logical 
skill in making the deduction, or from carelessness, he often 
errs. Much more is one liable to err when judging the act 
of another person. For the subjective movement of another 
is beyond one's observation, and can be known only by his 
confessions, his professions, or by his outward perceptible 
movements, these together with circumstances being signs 
from which the internal act is inferred. This additional in- 
ference greatly increases the uncertainty of the conclusion, 
and warns against hasty judgment. 

§ 39. What is the specific action of which the moral qual- 
ity is a property ? In other words, what is the distinct and 



BIGHT AND WRONG 53 

informing fact wherein conscience discerns obligatory moral 
quality, and whereon we pass discriminating moral judgment ? 

It is to be premised that no fact of causation has moral 
quality. Whatever is caused is necessitated by its cause to 
be just what it is. There is no alternative. Moreover, by 
the axiom of uniformity, that like causes have like effects, 
there is no variation in effects, if there be none in their 
causes. This is the realm of necessity. It is opposed to 
the realm of freedom, wherein alone moral quality finds 
place ; for freedom must be allowed as conditio sine qua non 
of moral action. Only beings having free will are morally 
responsible, and among these only such persons as are con- 
scious of moral obligation. 

Outward physical or muscular action, therefore, has in 
itself no moral quality, not even that outward action com- 
monly called voluntary. For the movement of the muscles 
is due to physical causes originating in the brain, and this 
brain action causing muscular motion is itself caused by ante- 
cedent mental action. Hence only to mental action can 
moral quality be immediately attributed. 

The exercise of conscience discerning moral quality, for 
like reason, has in itself no moral quality ; it is neither right 
nor wrong. Knowledge of right and wrong, and of the dis- 
tinction between them, arises on the presentation of a per- 
sonal action, which empirical occasion is a condition precedent. 
Moreover, conscience can never have the quality imported 
into it ; for its exercise is originally and essentially involun- 
tary, the discernment intuitively necessary. The same is 
true of all pure intuitions. 

All empirical intuitions, as the sense-perceptions, are like- 
wise destitute in themselves of moral quality, since they are 
the involuntary products of our constitution in the presence 
©f causative objects. 

The exercise of the logical faculty, even in case of moral 



54 OBLIGATION 

judgment, has no moral quality in itself, for it is an effect of 
voluntary attention. 

The like consideration sets aside, not only all presentations 
and the representations of thought, but also the representa- 
tions of mediate perception, memory and imagination, together 
with the feelings and desires that attend them. All these are 
strictly effects, and therefore destitute in themselves of moral 
quality. 

§ 40. Consequently, in our search for the activity which 
has moral quality in itself, we are shut up to the volitions. 
Volition has three constitutive elements, choice, intention, 
effort. 

This last, the effort, which is voluntary attention, is caused 
by the motive, the desire that prevails, without alternative. 
Hence the effort is a necessitated act, and so without moral 
quality, in itself neither right nor wrong. 

The first element, the choice, viewed simply as an act 
apart from its specific character, is also causally necessitated 
to take place or occur by the mere presentation of possible 
alternatives ; I must choose between them. Hence the simple 
act of choosing is in itself destitute of moral quality. 

But the choice of one alternative rather than the other, 
the taking this rather than that, is a fact uncaused, not neces- 
sitated, free ; for herein is the specific characteristic and the 
very essence of choice. In its resolution choice becomes 
intention, the intention to do or forbear a certain action. 
This central fact, the only fact in human nature or in nature 
at large that is not caused to be what it is, this resolution, 
this intention, purpose, design, this alone is capable of inhe- 
rent moral quality. 

An intention, though not causally determined, is rationally 
determined, is in accord with some one or more reasons. 
Now the moral law furnishes a reason naturally and therefore 



EIGHT AND WRONG 55 

rightly dominating all others, and since it is the intention 
only that intelligently, impellingly, freely, preferably, con- 
forms to or disregards moral law, it follows that the intention 
properly has moral quality, is either right or wrong. 

Moreover, since the all-dominating moral law, the ultimate 
and absolute criterion of conduct, is addressed directly and 
exclusively to choice becoming intention, it follows that the 
intention is never morally indifferent, is always either right 
or wrong; right, when it intelligently, reverently and will- 
ingly conforms to the law ; wrong, when it knowingly violates 
or merely disregards the law. 

From these considerations it is manifest that the moral 
law applies, not directly to the outward, expressed, objective 
activity, but primarily and immediately to the inward, ante- 
cedent, subjective intention. Hence, if we regard a trespass 
as an action passing over from one person onto another, a 
realization of an intention inflicting injury, the formula of 
the moral law should be : Thou shalt not intend to do aught 
that would involve a trespass. It will be better, however, to 
regard a trespass as the total activity, including both the 
subjective antecedents and the objective consequents, the 
moral quality of this total residing in the intention. 

§ 41. That moral quality is thus a constant property of 
intention requires some further consideration, especially of 
the distinction between the intention to do an act and the 
ulterior intention with which it is done or the purpose. 

There is a large class of offenses varying in degree from 
extreme criminality to comparatively slight culpability, such 
as murder, stealing, lying, betting, whose very essence is 
trespass. Hence the intentional doing of an action of this 
class is wrong; or, more closely, the intention to do it is 
wrong, wrong in itself, being a radical violation of the law of 
trespass. Complete, successful action is not requisite to 



56 OBLIGATION 

constitute guilt. An attempt, an overt act, though it fail, is 
evidence of guilty intention, and therefore condemnable ; as 
in the murderous contrivance of Guy Fawkes, and in the 
villainous slander of Don John. A mere intention to do 
the deed, an intention that, perhaps for want of opportunity, 
never passes into overt action, is already a culpable violation 
of the law. Now what is essentially wrong can never become 
right, for this would be a contradiction. Hence any of this 
class of intents can never be justified by an ulterior end, 
however good, wise, benevolent this may be. No end can 
sanctify such means. We may never do evil that good may 
come. 

Conversely, what is essentially right can never become 
wrong. The intention to do an act that is right in itself 
alone considered cannot be vitiated by an ulterior purpose, 
however vicious this may be. Shylock did a righteous act in 
the loan of the ducats ; it was his ulterior purpose that was 
wicked. 

There is another class of intents that, in themselves alone 
considered, have no moral quality; as an intent to give 
money, to take a walk, to write a letter, and very many oth- 
ers. Such are usually spoken of as morally indifferent. But 
an intent of this sort, being properly of a means to an end, 
has the moral quality of the intended end imputed to it ; in 
other words, the proposed end sanctifies or vilifies the pro- 
posed means, this becoming right or wrong according to the 
ultimate purpose, or the intention with which it is done. If 
I propose to give money, which intent in itself has no moral 
quality, with the further intent to relieve distress, the intent 
to give becomes right ; if to buy votes, it becomes wrong. 
So the intended means takes its moral color from the in- 
tended end ; for the intention in such case is to be judged 
in its totality, not in its dependent parts ; it is dyed through- 
out with a uniform hue. 



BIGHT AND WRONG 57 

§ 42. The principle that moral quality is imputed to acts 
which in themselves have none, is of wider application. 

Let us recall the fundamental fact in human nature that 
a free will is the primary condition of moral activity, is the 
central essence of personality, and is most nearly identical 
with the ego, is I myself. To it alone of my powers, that is 
to me myself, the mandate of the moral law is addressed, 
since by it alone am I able to direct my powers. For the 
functional property of will is to control, according to its 
freely formed intention, by means of attention, directly or 
indirectly, all other elements of personality, as cognitions, 
feelings, desires and muscular motions, awaking or stimu- 
lating or repressing their activity; and its obligation is to 
exert this control according to the supreme moral law. 

The mastery of the representative cognitions, of mediate 
perception, memory, imagination and thought, is immedi- 
diately accomplished by directing attention to this or that 
object as one may choose. They thus have moral quality 
imported into them, or imputed or attributed to them, accord- 
ing to the intention. For the effort of attention is a passing 
from the sphere of freedom into the sphere of causation or 
necessity, and what shall take place in this sphere, being 
determined by the freely formed intention, is marked by 
the moral quality of the determinant, becomes essentially 
right or wrong by imputation. I am morally obligated, for 
instance, to exert and regulate my logical faculty in search 
for truth, its proper object, especially for such truth as bears 
upon conduct, lest an error lead to trespass. The moral 
judgment, by inference from the moral principle, thus dis- 
covers reasons determining intentional conduct, and so is 
obligated, through the will, to a most patient and vigorous 
exercise, which is also, because of this obligation, a righteous 
exercise. Neglect of the obligation, or failure to fulfill it, 
renders us responsible for our avoidable errors and their con- 
sequences. 



58 OBLIGATION 

Inasmuch as feeling is correlated with knowing, our emo- 
tions and sentiments are subject to indirect yet efficient con- 
trol by means of the direct control of the cognitions with 
which they coordinately cooperate. For, since we can at 
will directly transfer attention from object to object, we are 
able thus indirectly to induce or repress the feelings that 
attend contemplation. These, therefore, have moral quality 
imputed to them, those that are normal or orderly being 
right, those that are abnormal or disorderly either in kind or 
in degree being wrong. They can and should be controlled, 
regulated, well-ordered. Because of its vast importance, let 
belief be instanced. It is the feeling of conviction, the assur- 
ance of physical or moral certainty that attends or is correla- 
tive to the recognition of truth. Its opposites are the 
feelings of doubt and disbelief. Now obviously, so far as 
we are under obligation to search out attainable truth, thus 
becoming responsible for our ignorance of what we could and 
should know, just so far are we bound to believe and are 
responsible for doubt or disbelief of attainable truth ; these, 
indeed, being merely correlative statements. Hence we can 
be and are reasonably commanded to believe authentic or 
accessible truth ; the belief of it is right, the doubt or dis- 
belief is wrong. 

Likewise desires have imputed moral quality. Desire is 
conditioned on real or imaginary objects of cognition ; con- 
sequently it comes and goes with their contemplation. Since 
this is under direct control, the desire can be effectively 
though indirectly regulated, and is right or wrong according 
to the volition. But because desire directly solicits choice 
and becomes the motive in effectuating the intention, it re- 
ceives moral quality in a marked degree. For example, 
covetousness, which may be taken as the type of abnormal 
desire, is forbidden in the law, Thou shalt not covet ; the 
only one of the Decalogue formally subjective. Thereby I 



BIGHT AND WRONG 59 

am commanded to suppress covetousness whenever it instinc- 
tively or spontaneously appears, much more am I forbidden to 
incite and cherish it. I am required to choose, intend and 
enforce its cessation ; for it is abnormal and evil, tending to 
objective disorder and trespass. Therefore I do wrong to 
allow it, and it becomes wrong by the allowance. Normal 
desires, which within their limits not only are right in them- 
selves, but constitute the very basis of all human rights, 
become abnormal and evil by degree, either when weakened 
by inattention to their objects, or when immoderate and inor- 
dinate by excess. They then become wrong, because I do 
wrong in neglecting or failing to regulate them. 

External activities, the movements of the voluntary mus- 
cles, and their proximate consequences, are, for like reason, 
right or wrong by imputation. It is only by an observation 
of his overt acts that one's mental states, thus expressed, can 
be judged by other persons. Hence we correctly speak of 
good deeds, bad habits, and the reverse, and approve or cen- 
sure them; but always with reference, though tacit, to the 
subjective intention. 

It is a weighty and impressive truth that, not only our out- 
ward conduct, but our innermost thoughts, imaginings, feel- 
ings and desires, all at all times, are made by their intentions 
right or wrong ; that we are responsible, not only for every 
idle word, but for every idle thought or wish ; and that in 
the perfected administration of moral government, all these 
shall be brought into judgment. Who hath ears to hear, let 
him hear. 

§ 43. The many deeds that are essentially trespass, wrong 
in themselves, are not known to be so intuitively, but only 
by inference from the moral principle as an ultimate major 
premise. Hence we are liable to error in judging them, 
especially in the less obvious cases. The error arises from 



60 OBLIGATION 

an obscure or confused apprehension of the ultimate princi- 
ple or law, or from an incomplete or inaccurate knowledge of 
the particular case subsumed, or from bad logic in making 
the deduction. Hence it sometimes happens that one sin- 
cerely desiring to do right, having a motive and an ulterior 
purpose that are right, honestly judging and believing that 
what he is doing is right, may nevertheless be doing what is 
wrong in itself, essentially, unalterably wrong. 

Also it is true that every man in all cases is morally bound 
to do what in his best judgment seems to him to be right. 
In popular phraseology, he must obey his conscience ; is 
doing right, if he acts conscientiously ; is wrong, if he vio- 
late his conscience. Obviously it is implied that one should 
carefully exercise his best ability in judging a case, bringing 
to bear upon it all the light attainable, unobscured by predi- 
lection, repugnance or passion; then, having done this, he 
must conform his conduct to the result of his judgment. If 
circumstances require a prompt decision, without time for 
close consideration, then a habit of moral thought and a 
familiarity with moral principles greatly enhance the proba- 
bility of a correct decision; but in any case it is morally 
necessary that he intend and do what his moral judgment 
approves ; otherwise he becomes a willful offender. 

Now, putting this and that together, we have the moral 
paradox, that one in doing what is wrong in itself may be 
doing right. This is an inevitable consequence of the imper- 
fections of moral judgment. Othello was bound by high 
principles of honor, as he understood them and the case, to 
commit uxoricide. The infanticide by the Hindu mother is 
an act of piety. Saul as persecutor verily thought he was 
doing God service. Conversely, one in doing what is right 
in itself may be doing wrong. A judge in granting a right- 
eous suit is doing what is right ; but if he do it merely to 
escape annoyance or censure, or to entangle the plaintiff in 
evil consequences, he is in the same act doing wrong. 



RIGHT AND WRONG 61 

This moral paradox involves imperfect persons in dreadful 
responsibilities. We are answerable not only for wrong be- 
lieved to be wrong, but for wrong believed to be right, and 
for right believed to be wrong. 'Tis a strait and narrow 
way. A legal maxim holds that Ignorantia juris non excusat ; 
but, in equity, ignorance or sincerity in a moral blunder pal- 
liates, especially in a penitent, though it does not excuse, an 
offense, and so becomes a ground for mercy by a mitigation 
or a transfer of punishment. Naturally we do not shudder 
at the crime of Othello, as we do at those of Macbeth. Saul 
obtained forgiveness because of ignorance. Divine mercy 
dictated the prayer: Father forgive them; for they know 
not what they do. 



62 OBLIGATION 



CHAPTER VII 

JUSTICE 

§ 44. Thus far the moral law has been considered chiefly 
as prohibiting aggressive and injurious acts or lines of action. 
The formula, Thou shalt not trespass, primarily forbids what- 
ever unwarrantably interferes in another's liberty. Its cor- 
recting effect is to put a strong positive check upon the 
hindering activities of related persons, to the end that every 
one may fully gratify his normal desires ; it restrains within 
bounds the course of each, so that all others may freely exer- 
cise their rightful license. This prohibitory sense is so obvi- 
ous and emphatic that many who are under the law conceive 
that by keeping within the prescribed bounds the demands 
of the law are satisfied, that purity and innocence, which are 
negatives, fulfill its behest, that to forbear injurious aggres- 
sion is the sum of obligation. 

But this is a very inadequate conception of the content of 
the law, a law enjoining an order of facts that ought to be ; 
enjoining in the negative sense of forbidding one class, and 
enjoining in the positive sense of requiring another class. It 
lays upon us the injunction both to refrain and to perform. 
It says, Thou shalt not transgress stated bounds ; and by 
necessary implication, it also says Thou shalt do many things 
within those bounds. This positive requisition is not less 
obligatory than the prohibition, and it is merely because of 
the imperfection of language, unfitted to express both the 
positive and negative aspects of one and the same thought 
or mandate in a single simple formula, that the one is appar- 
ently more emphatic than the other. 



JUSTICE 63 

The necessary implication of active obligation is readily- 
explicated. Trespass is effected either by commission or by 
omission. That the one is direct, the other indirect, is not a 
difference in essence, and either may be a wrong as heinous 
and as fatal as the other. In the various relations of men, 
every one has rightful claims upon the activities of others, 
and they who omit to fulfill these claims commit a wrong, a 
trespass. For, my willful omission of an act to which some 
other has a right, is a violation of his right, is to leave him 
under a restraint of his rightful liberty, which restraint I 
am bound to remove. To be merely negligent, heedless, 
thoughtless, careless of another's right to my action, is to 
embarrass him more or less, is to interfere indirectly in his 
liberty, and thus is to trespass on him. Therefore, to him 
that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin. 

The point here brought squarely to the front has been to 
some extent anticipated in several places. In what follows 
we shall give it full recognition, and allow its weight to 
establish the equilibrium between forbearing and doing, which 
equilibrium a correct conception requires. Thus it will 
appear that the law of trespass rightly interpreted applies 
exhaustively to the relations of man to man, and is compre- 
hensive of every phase of obligation. 

§ 45. The term justice is the abstract from the concrete 
form just. To be just is to concede to everyone his rights ; 
and justice is the concession of rights. This is the most 
general sense. When a right consists in a specific claim on 
the action or inaction of some one, the concession of a just 
man implies his action or inaction in satisfaction of the claim. 
Accordingly a distinction is sometimes laid down between 
justitia interna, disposition to do right, and justitia externa, 
rectitude of conduct. The opposite of justice is injustice, 
which is to refuse or to neglect the concession, and of course 



64 OBLIGATION 

its actualization. Whoever is treated unjustly, be the injury 
great or small, is thereby restrained, more or less, in his right- 
ful liberty to gratify some normal desire, which restraint is 
essentially a trespass. 

Indeed it is quite obvious that injustice is trespass, and 
trespass injustice ; and that the law forbidding trespass is a 
law forbidding injustice. For, according to the moral princi- 
ple, every one has a right, if not trespassing, to gratify his 
normal desires ; .but it is impossible to have this gratification 
in a multitude of cases except by concession of one's fel- 
lows ; hence, if they withhold the concession, they disap- 
point his desires, and nullify his claims. For example, I 
have a right to the fulfillment of all formal contracts and of 
all informal promises made to me, whether for money or ser- 
vice, a right to the payment of all that is my due ; if the 
debtor refuse, or if any one hinder his payment, it is a tres- 
pass, an injustice. Also I have a right to acquire knowledge, 
property, social position ; and if any one hinder my effort, 
or neglect due help, he does me a wrong. Again, I have a 
rightful claim on my fellows for a fair judgment on my char- 
acter and conduct ; and to deny me the measure of honorable 
esteem to which I am entitled is a gross injury ; to slander 
me, one still more gross. Moreover, I am naturally a social 
being ; and if, without warrant, my association with compan- 
ions is prevented or disconcerted, my right is infringed, I 
suffer a wrong, a trespass, an injustice. Thus injustice, or 
its cognate injury, is as truly committed, indirectly, by with- 
holding or perverting a right, as by directly inflicting damage. 
Also it is evident that to prohibit injustice is to command 
justice. The sole difference is in the negative and positive 
expression of the same thing. The injunction, Thou shalt 
not trespass, is identical with the injunction, Be thou just. 

§ 46. Justice taken specifically, with reference to matters 



JUSTICE 65 

involving gain or loss, is subdivided into corrective and dis- 
tributive justice. 

Corrective justice is fairness in exchange, or honesty in a 
general sense. It is either voluntary, as in trade, in the 
market, in commerce, in fulfilling contracts and promises, in 
payment of debts, in remuneration for service rendered ; or 
it is involuntary and rectoral, enforced by decrees of the 
courts in civil cases, as in the settlement of suits, the award 
of damages, the reparation of illegal trespass. 

Distributive justice is distinguished from corrective by not 
including the notion of exchange. It is the proper partition 
of possessions and honors among members of society. It 
corresponds to the notion of approbation or censure bestowed 
in proportion to individual merit or demerit, to the award of 
prizes, and of penalties in criminal cases. When a man's 
course in life entitles him to the esteem of his fellows, and 
to such outward honors as express their valuation of his 
worth, distributive justice requires that these be accorded. 
From the recipient of a benefaction it requires gratitude. It 
is violated by excessive adulation or by slander ; even by a 
secret misjudging of another's worth. In case of overt in- 
fraction of law it is satisfied rather than rectified by penalty. 

§ 47. Justice, in the narrow sense of legal justice, is 
administered by courts of law. The civil law, or else the 
common law, and the statute law, which these courts apply 
to cases, together with the forms by which their proceedings 
are regulated and their decrees enforced, all have their imme- 
diate ground in the authority of the State, their ultimate 
ground in human rights, and all are specific reductions of the 
one law forbidding trespass, commanding justice. Jurispru- 
dence, in general, is the science of rights as formulated and 
sanctioned by governing powers. It is the science of enacted 
law, investigating the principles common to all systems of 



66 OBLIGATION 

law. Morality enjoins obedience to the universal, natural 
law, jus naturale, in all possible relations of men ; jurispru- 
dence enjoins and exacts obedience to that law only in so far 
as it is recognized and authorized in the enactments of the 
State. Thus jurisprudence is a branch of ethics. 

It is clear, then, that law-makers do not originate obliga- 
tions ; their office is merely to interpret and formulate the 
obligations already existing, and to enact special sanctions. 
All laws, organic, municipal, military, international, all ordi- 
nances, canons, edicts, decrees, treaties and arbitrations, have 
the same ultimate basis, the moral law ; they must be just 
to be obligatory. Jussum quia justum est. If the law-making 
power, or, more generally, the constituted authority, depart 
from its function, and promulgate laws or ordinances at vari- 
ance with the one moral law, or for other ends than those of 
public and private justice, or in disregard of the original and 
inalienable rights of the subject, then the enforcement of such 
laws and ordinances is unjust rule, is tyranny. 

One qualification is needful. If an unrighteous law be 
not intolerably oppressive, and does not induce or sanction 
an immorality in the subject, then he is morally bound to 
obey it ; for, since it emanates from constituted authority, a 
refusal to obey would be a trespass on the State through its 
accredited agents. The remedy is a repeal of the law. But 
if a law be so unjust as to be intolerable, then there is appeal 
to the higher law, jus naturale, by one as by Hampden, or by 
many as by the English colonists in America. This is rebel- 
lion, resulting perhaps in revolution. 

The laws enacted by any human government, however 
they may be elaborated and refined in the interest of thorough 
justice, are nevertheless unavoidably inadequate and imper- 
fect. They can effectually prohibit only the grosser forms of 
wrong doing, and secure the practice of mutual justice only 
in certain definite transactions, the vast majority of existing 



JUSTICE 67 

obligations, many of the weightiest, being beyond the reach 
of the courts. Moreover, in such cases as come under the 
laws, and of which the courts of law take cognizance, it is 
very often difficult and sometimes impracticable to determine 
and administer strict justice. Yet, notwithstanding these 
inherent defects, the laws and the courts of law are the tense 
woof in the texture of social organization. 

§ 48. Very early in the progress of civilization the prac- 
tice of equity arose as a complementary extension of legality. 
The ancients, in measuring building material of irregular 
surface, used a flexible leaden rule. Equity, like a leaden 
rule, bends to the specialities of each case, while the iron 
rule of enacted law is inflexible. Circumstances alter cases, 
and law rigidly applied may work injustice. Summum jus, 
summa injuria. Laws are expressed in general terms, and 
being framed with reference to ordinary cases, it often hap- 
pens that the actual cases involve matter beyond their scope. 
Moreover, there are many matters requiring adjudication for 
which the laws make no provision. It is the part of equity 
to supply such deficiencies by special action. Thence have 
arisen courts of equity or courts of chancery, distinguishable 
from courts of law. The decisions of a judge in equity are 
regulated, when there is no binding precedent or statute, by 
reference to the original principles of justice which give rise 
to enacted laws ; hence his decisions are a species of legisla- 
tion, judicial legislation. In the development and refinement 
of common and statute law, many of the approved decisions 
in equity have become incorporated in those systems ; and 
equity itself, being more and more determined by precedent, 
has become assimilated to the common law. Hence in many 
of our States there is a fusion of official function, the same 
court, sometimes on the same case, sitting now in law, now 
in equity. 



68 OBLIGATION 

Casting off these limitations of its technical and juridical 
sense, the exercise of equity in the common intercourse of 
men is the doing what is equal, fair and right. It is the 
equitable between man and man, grounded on equal subjec- 
tion to moral law or equality of rights among men, whether 
formulated in contracts, or existing in their merely natural 
relations. The distinction between equity in this general 
sense and the justice administered by the courts, that is, 
between the claims of human charity or natural justice and 
the claims of legal justice, corresponds nearly with the dis- 
tinction between imperfect and perfect rights ; a distinction, 
however, that is merely practical, not essential. Equity, in 
its wide sense, and natural justice are coextensive, and both 
are synonymous with right ; etymologically, the opposite of 
justice is injury, of equity iniquity. The notion of equity 
and justice limited to jurisprudence, is a narrow and inade- 
quate view bounded by a rugged horizon ; but in their large 
and proper meaning they expand over the whole sphere of 
obligation, and are equivalent to rectitude and righteousness. 

§ 49. Mercy is righteous forbearance toward an offender. 
It implies kindness or gentleness, and is prompted by pity 
or compassion. These feelings, when intense, are apt to 
induce a sentimental aversion to the claims of strict justice. 
Hence mercy is popularly supposed to be in opposition to 
justice, implying a disposition to overlook injury, and to mit- 
igate or even wholly remit the penalty that sanctions the 
law. Such displacement of justice is not righteous forbear- 
ance, and so is not true mercy, but a weak indulgence of 
wrong that upholds license and works injustice. True mercy 
forbears, whatever legal forms may allow, to exceed or to 
abate the claims of natural justice. 

Every man is necessarily a judge, not only of his own 
actions, but also of those of his fellows. Whether his judg- 



JUSTICE 69 

ment find utterance in words and deeds of requital or not, he 
is bound to be just. Any excess of severity is injustice to 
the subject; any abatement of righteous rigor is injustice 
to society whose welfare is involved in the right judgment of 
its members. Mercy is shown in forbearing to do or even to 
think what is not strictly just. 

The judge on the bench must be just. Usually, by the 
very terms of the law which he is set to administer, he has a 
measure of discretion ; but he must not transgress its sharply 
defined bounds, and within these he is to use discretion, not 
license. The range is allowed, not for the play of pity or of 
resentment, but in order that he may mercifully adjust his 
decree to the peculiarities of a case. Too great severity is 
injustice to a party present; too great leniency is injustice 
to society whose interest he is empowered to guard. Judicial 
mercy secures a righteous forbearance of trespass on either, 
thus not merely coexisting but coinciding with strict justice. 
The criminal law is merciful in holding the accused innocent 
until proved guilty, and in giving him the benefit of doubt ; 
which is but just. With a chief executive or sovereign is 
lodged a pardoning power. This prerogative of clemency is 
not for sentimental exercise, but for the equitable adjustment 
of penal desert and general welfare. It is mercy, but also it 
is justice. 

Shall not the judge of all the earth do right ? Justice and 
judgment are the habitation of his throne, mercy and truth 
go before his face. He is long-suffering and of great mercy, 
forgiving iniquity and transgression, yet in no case clearing 
the guilty. Justice, no less than mercy, is an essential attri- 
bute to God. He, as absolute sovereign, decrees unbounded 
mercy to the penitent, and vindicates the claim of immutable 
justice by a vicarious sacrifice. Such is the Christian scheme ; 
such is divine mercy. 



70 OBLIGATION 



CHAPTER VIII 

DUTY AND VIRTUE 

§ 50. The obligations, both active and passive, laid upon 
us in the moral law are duties. Duty is the name of a rela- 
tion, and so requires two terms. Every duty is because of 
something due from one person to another. It is the rela- 
tion of debtor to creditor. Honesty, honor requires the pay- 
ment of debt. The commercial meaning of dues or debts is 
merely a specific application of the essential sense inherent 
in these terms in their general application to every phase of 
human obligation. 

To withhold what is due another is a violation of his 
right, is an unwarranted interference in his liberty of action, 
is a trespass, and is forbidden by the moral law. But to 
forbid non-payment is to command payment. Pay thy dues. 
Owe no man anything. We must pay what we owe. We 
ought to render to every man his own, that is, what we owe 
him. These are but varied expressions of the one injunc- 
tion, Trespass not, Be thou just, Do thy duty. Ethics may 
fairly be defined as the science of duty. 

§ 51. Right and duty are coextensive, merely different 
aspects of the same notion. Right belongs to the action, 
and is conformity to law. Duty belongs to the agent, and 
is subjection to law. Hence they imply each other. That 
whatever is duty is right, is quite evident. That whatever 
is right is duty, is readily seen. For, each case as it arises 
is subsumed under the law, or under rules, maxims of con- 
duct, deduced from the law, and a conclusion is drawn as to 



DUTY AND YIBTTJE 71 

what is right, what ought to be done. Now from given 
premises, if the terms be unambiguous and the reasoning 
correct, only one conclusion can follow, certainly not two or 
more essentially different. Therefore, in every conceivable 
situation there is for the moment one and only one course 
that is right ; and this action alone being right it ought or 
owes to be done. When an action is clearly conceived to be 
right, that action and that alone is duty. 

It is a corollary that duty is but another name for obliga- 
tion, whose measure is found in the full application of the 
whole law to the whole life. Also it follows that duties 
never conflict. Often we are confused and in doubt as to 
the particular obligation, but of two possible acts, one being 
right, the other is wrong. There is no "divided duty." 
Moreover, it is wrong, ex vi termini, to do less than one 
ought to do ; also it is wrong to do more ; for this is an ex- 
penditure that is due elsewhere ; for example, to overpay a 
bill. Sometimes one ought to do all he can; he is never 
bound to do more, but frequently less. 

The essential identity of justice and right, and of injustice 
and trespass, has already been indicated. Hence it suffi- 
ciently appears that, right and duty being equivalent, justice 
and duty are likewise equivalent terms. In a didactic treat- 
ment of ethics, it is far less important to mark the shades of 
distinction among these synonymous terms, a right, right, 
justice, equity, mercy, obligation, duty, than it is to show 
distinctly that, as to their essence, they are one and the same, 
and that a violation of any one is a wrong, an injustice, a 
trespass. 

§ 52. An action conforming to moral law is a virtuous 
action. This qualification implies a contrary inclination 
overcome by will. It is the doing of justice, the perform- 
ance of duty, in a particular case, wherein the agent was 



72 OBLIGATION 

tempted to disregard obligation by an opposed desire, against 
which there was a voluntary struggle ending in its subjec- 
tion. A virtuous person is one with whom the voluntary 
suppression of wrong desire is habitual, he subjecting him- 
self uniformly to the law of duty, and thus molding his 
character anew. Under the law of habit, that our faculties 
acquire f acility and strength by exercise, the righteous desires 
of the virtuous person prevail more and more uniformly, 
while their opposites, denied the nourishment of gratifica- 
tion, become weaker and suffer atrophy ; until, finally, when 
and although all conflict, all struggle, has ceased, the victor, 
because of his victory, is dubbed a perfectly virtuous person. 
The abstract name of this mark is virtue. In general, 
virtue is the conformity of will to the law discerned by prac- 
tical reason or conscience. This definition implies that all 
subjective activities are regulated, duly coordinated and sub- 
ordinated, so that each fulfills its normal function ; thus 
enabling objective activities to attain their highest efficiency. 
Primarily it indicates the subjection of the craving to the 
giving desires ; secondarily, the bringing of the members of 
each class into harmonious cooperation. Otherwise there is 
a continual strife, the lust of the flesh against the spirit and 
disorderly preferences of each, that is incompatible with per- 
fected virtue. Such entire harmony is perhaps an unattainable 
ideal, but in human nature there is a native impulse toward 
it, and an ability to approximate it. Virtue, then, is a pro- 
ficiency in willing what is conformed to practical reason, 
developed from the state of natural potentiality by practical 
action. 

§ 53. The cardinal virtues, as commonly listed, are forti- 
tude, prudence, temperance and justice. The distribution 
originated with the Greek philosophers, and still holds in 
modern literature. They are called cardinal, because the 



BUTT AND VIBTUE 73 

specific virtues hinge on them, and indeed they seem to be 
conditions rather than kinds of virtue. Each may be con- 
sidered a fountain from which virtues flow. The Pythag- 
oreans and Plato regard fortitude, prudence and temperance 
together as the source of justice, and justice as the genius of 
all duty, of all virtue, the perfection of human nature and 
of human society. With Aristotle also, justice is perfect 
virtue," yet not absolutely, but in reference to others. In 
this wide sense we have used the term justice, viewing it as 
the sum of all virtues, which are but variations upon its 
essence, and are universally prescribed in the concrete com- 
mandment, Be thou just. 

§ 54. The man who disregards moral law, or in whom the 
desire to do right is weak, passes, by frequently yielding to 
temptation, under the dominion of other desires. Especially 
the appetites are likely, by reckless indulgence, to acquire 
abnormal vigor, and drive the weakened will helplessly into 
gross excesses. The appetencies, in men of higher order, 
may take control, producing the refined voluptuary, the 
avaricious seeker after material wealth, the secluded scholar 
absorbed in the pursuit of " knowledge for its own sake," or 
the unscrupulous ruler ambitious of irresponsible power. 
The will, whose function it is to regulate these constitutional 
powers, restraining their exercise, and determining natural, 
which is normal and moral order, forsakes this high office, 
and becomes their servant. Thus the man is enslaved by 
his passions. His moral sense is deafened by their clamor, 
his actions are determined by their impelling energy, his 
independent self-mastery is lost, and his freedom is limited to 
a choice among contending masters and forms of obedience. 

To prevent or to escape from such degraded and deplora- 
ble condition, one must, by good-will working in the light of 
conscience, bring all his powers into subjection to moral law. 



74 OBLIGATION 

This regulation will give play to the faculties in their natural 
relations and proportions, which is the essence of right action, 
and will determine uniformity of fit conduct, which is moral 
order, the order of facts that ought to be. Such virtuous 
rectification secures peace, harmony, and the dignity of moral 
excellence. 

The virtue that brings our activities into due conformity 
with moral law is usually posited as the necessary condition 
of soul-liberty, and perfected virtue is identified with per- 
fected liberty. In surmounting his passions and inclinations, 
one becomes a freedman, a freeman and a master. The sage, 
said the Stoics, feels but is without passion, he is not indul- 
gent but just to himself and to others, he alone attains to 
the complete performance of duty, and thus he alone is free. 1 
This is the common doctrine of moralists at the present day, 
and we are exhorted to the exercise of morality because of 
the worth of liberty. 

The liberty thus acquired is independence of unrighteous, 
discordant and distracting rulers. The virtuous man is freed 
from the dominion of overweening inclinations, of unholy 
lusts and passions. It is an ideal state, exciting our admira- 
tion and emulation. But this liberty is merely relative, not 
absolute. In breaking loose from subjective bondage, we 
pass under the objective bondage of law, an exchange of one 
bondage for another. All language supports this view. We 
are bound to do duty, obliged or under obligation to be just, 
forbidden to trespass, and must submit to many pains in 
fulfilling the demands of an inexorable law, constant vigi- 
lance being the price of impunity. This is not liberty, but 
rigorous bondage. It is a voluntary bondage, one that ex- 
pands and ennobles our powers, satisfies the all pervading 
and overwhelming sense of duty, and harmonizes the man 
with himself and with universal order. Still it is bond- 
age. Strict morality is strict subjection. Absolute liberty is 
incompatible with law. 



SELFISHNESS 75 



CHAPTER IX 

SELFISHNESS 

§ 55. Names of mental states with the prefix self abound 
in speech and literature. A few are, self-approbation, self- 
condemnation, self-denial, self-control, self-esteem, self-abhor- 
rence, self-love. Many of this class of expressions probably 
have their origin in the fictitious idea of an alter ego. The 
human mind subjectively distinguishes between the ego as 
conscious and the ego as represented. The former, the con- 
sciousness of self, is an element in every feeling, is essential 
to the existence of any feeling, and is itself recognized as a 
feeling. The latter, the representation of self, is a normal 
and habitual cognition, wherein the ego contemplates itself 
as an object, distinguishes itself from itself, and views this 
subjective object as though it were really another self, an 
alter ego. The idea of an alter ego is strengthened by a 
conflict of desires ; the opposed impulses, being a pair, are 
personified as two selves. Moreover, the mind regards the 
objectified and personified self as a possession of the wholly 
subjective self, and capable of being affected by it, which 
finds expression in such familiar phrases as one's self, control 
yourself, I hold myself responsible, and the like. The two 
are identified in the phrases I myself, he himself, we our- 
selves, they themselves. 

This distinction between the conscious ego and the repre- 
sented ego, is unreal, inasmuch as it contravenes the essential 
unity of the ego. Evidently, in thought it is a fiction, in 
speech a metaphor. Hence, although it is a natural, a normal 



76 OBLIGATION 

mode of mind, there is need of caution lest it mislead us to 
commit the fallacy of figure of speech. 

§ 56. The name self-love is commonly used to denote that 
longing for gratification which marks the craving desires 
when their end is self. But love is essentially a desire to 
benefit some other one, and this is contrary to the benefit of 
self. It necessarily implies a relation between two ; in self 
there is really and literally but one. The compound word 
self-love is, therefore, a contradiction in terms, absurd literally, 
and can be allowed only as a metaphor derived from the fan- 
ciful idea of an alter ego. 

But self-love is merely a misnomer, for the reality of the 
thing thus absurdly named is unquestionable. It is self- 
interest, or simply interest, egoism, selfishness, the opposite 
of love. For while love is desire to impart, interest is desire 
to profit. Egoism makes self the end, seeking one's own 
enjoyment and welfare at cost of or in disregard of another's. 
Psychologically it is the supremacy of the craving desires, 
the appetites and appetencies, over the affections ; either dis- 
regarding these, or neglecting their call, or what is worse, a 
more intense and refined egoism, making the affections sub- 
serve self. Clearly the term self-love is a euphemism, filch- 
ing the name of love to sanctify what in truth is its contrary, 
interest, egoism, selfishness. That, however disguised, it is 
to be condemned, will sufficiently appear in the sequel. 

Closely related to the notion of self-love, is that of duty 
to self. Can I literally owe myself anything? Can I owe 
myself a dollar ? How is it to be paid ? By passing it from 
one pocket to another ? Can I in any manner or measure be 
indebted to myself ? Is anything due me from me ? Duty 
is essentially the name of a relation between two ; I myself 
am but one. I cannot possibly be in debt except to some 
other one. Hence the phrase duty to self is, in its terms, 



SELFISHNESS 77 

self-contradictory and absurd. It, too, originates in the 
fancied alter ego, to whom the ego is said to be indebted as 
to another person. Clearly it is a metaphor, and deductions 
from the generic law of duty to this as a species of duty 
commit the subtle fallaeia figurce dietionis. As in the phrase 
love of self, so in the phrase duty to self, we detect selfish- 
ness again masquerading, now in the guise and under the 
sacred name of duty. 

§ 57. But aside from terms the important question arises : 
Does not moral law command motives and actions that are 
selfish, that is, such as find in self an end ? Moralists very 
generally answer affirmatively, and recognize a wide and 
weighty class of obligations terminating in self, having re- 
spect exclusively to self, impelled by self-love, and usually 
entitled duties to self. For example, they teach that every 
one owes it to himself to be temperate, that moderation, as 
opposed to excess in all things, is a duty to one's self, for the 
sake of one's own personality, and in order to self-culture. 
Popular speech also quite commonly recognizes, and is dis- 
posed to emphasize, duties to self, usually holding them para- 
mount. It is heard in the every-day phrases, I owe it to my- 
self, he was bound in justice to himself so to do, and the like. 

Postponing for the present a direct argument of the ques- 
tion, we here observe merely that, if a man be morally bound 
in any case whatever to make himself an *end, or in other 
words, if there be any real thing answering to the lame 
phrase duty to self, then the moral law as heretofore formu- 
lated in this treatise is quite inadequate. For trespass 
necessarily implies at least two parties, and the given inter- 
pretation of duty and of justice, though very wide, presumes 
always a relation between two. Obviously, then, our view 
of moral obligation, in its widest comprehension, does not 
include the notion of duties to self, indeed it excludes self 
as an end. 



78 OBLIGATION 

And truly there is no duty to self. In this case the phrase 
is not merely a misnomer, for there is nothing corresponding 
to it in any admissible sense. Self is never, can never be a 
moral end, but on the contrary, all selfishness or egoism is 
violation of moral law. Duties, obligations universally relate 
to others, and selfishness is sin. 

§ 58. Let us briefly examine one or two of the duties usu- 
ally classed as duties to self, and indicate their altruistic 
interpretation. 

Temperance, or the control of appetites and passions, 
bringing them into conformity with reason, subjecting them 
to moral law, is commonly cited as one of the most compre- 
hensive and prominent duties to self. Is it my duty to be 
temperate ? Certainly. It is a cardinal virtue. Is it a duty 
I owe to myself in order to the perfection of my character ? 
Is it a discipline in the process of self-culture for the sake 
of my personal excellence? Assuredly, say nearly all the 
moralists, both ancient and modern, it finds in self its end. 

To be temperate is a primal duty, a weighty obligation ; 
but it is strictly a duty, an obligation, to others. I owe to 
God, my maker and highest benefactor, to modulate into 
harmony the powers he has given me, that I may fulfill the 
mission on which he has sent me, and accomplish the work 
he has assigned me in the world. I ought to be temperate, 
husbanding my energies, that I may serve my family, my 
neighbor, the community, the state, mankind, as fully and 
completely as possible. Unless I be temperate, I cannot pay 
these dues. Moreover, I ought to be an example, in this 
golden mean, to my fellows, inclining them to its practice. 
Temperance is one of the highest obligations. It is the top 
round in the ladder of Christian graces. It ennobles. Still 
it is due, not to self, but to those around. 

The pursuit of truth for the sake of truth is regarded as a 



SELFISHNESS 79 

refined and noble avocation. " Knowledge for its own sake " 
is a high sounding phrase; but it is merely a euphemism 
concealing the reality, which is knowledge for one's own 
sake, a refined selfishness. But the worth of knowledge is 
in its power for good, and he who possesses it in large meas- 
ure is a king among men. Every one is in duty bound to 
increase his stores, solely that he may thereby more effi- 
ciently promote the welfare of the present and the coming 
generations. 

Much the same may be said of the duty of preserving life 
and health and strength. These belong not to me save in 
trust. They belong to my relatives and friends, to mankind. 
I am a guardian and agent. So of the duty of physical, 
mental and moral culture. I am bound to account with 
usury for the talents intrusted to me. So of cleanliness, 
decency, modesty, propriety, in private as well as in public. 
So of the preservation of my personal dignity and self-respect, 
of my honor, sincerity and truthfulness. Even the indul- 
gence of innocent pleasures should be primarily for recrea- 
tion, preparing me for renewed efficiency in paying my 
dues. The supply of necessities should ever be governed 
by the same general purpose, so that whether we eat or 
drink, or whatsoever we do, let all be done for others' sake. 

§ 59. This doctrine is not ascetic, but altruistic. It trans- 
fers the end of all right action from an exclusive self to its 
fellows. All righteous conduct is disinterested, unselfish. 
The moral law, Trespass not, or Be just, or Do duty, is 
equivalent to, Withhold no due, but bestow in due measure. 
We say in due measure, for not all giving is righteous; a 
lavish or a disproportionate distribution of means or of ser- 
vice is wrong, being an expenditure that is due elsewhere. 

The virtuous exercise of self-denial, of self-sacrifice, when 
clearly understood, is not the giving up of what one has a 



80 OBLIGATION 

right to retain and enjoy, but the yielding to another his due, 
discharging his rightful claim, according to him a right of 
which he is perhaps quite ignorant. Truly it is a parting 
with what I might keep, but what I have no right to keep. 
It is free, unconstrained justice. 

While the chief, indeed the only end of life is usefulness, 
the promotion of the welfare of those to whom some one is 
related in accord with the relations, he is not thereby ex- 
cluded from participating in the benefaction. The law, by 
this doctrine, forbids his making himself alone the end, and 
requires his regard and intent to be constantly beyond him- 
self ; but it does not prohibit his sharing, as a member of a 
community of two or more, the welfare he promotes. It 
does not require self-abnegation, nor entire self-forgetfulness, 
but that the inclination, the impulse, the motive and the 
intention be altogether benevolent. 

It is a fact that in the judgment of mankind, for some rea- 
son or other, the practice of self-denial, of self-sacrifice, the 
exercise of affection, is held in high esteem, is accounted 
generous, noble, even heroic, and receives the warmest praise ; 
while, on the other hand, selfishness, exclusive or excessive 
regard for one's own, is accounted ignoble, ungenerous, mean, 
and is heartily condemned. Disinterested motives and con- 
duct are always praised ; interested motives and conduct are 
always blamed. Why is this? Is it a delusion? Is it 
merely because when my neighbor works in his own interest, 
I have less of his help in mine ? If so, then it is merely my 
selfishness that prompts me to condemn his. Is there not 
some less degrading, some better reason for the universal 
condemnation of interested action, and the universal appro- 
bation of disinterested service ? Surely there must be, for I 
judge after this manner of the conduct of the ancients, whose 
conduct cannot possibly affect me. Yet there is a school of 
moralists holding that disinterestedness is a delusion, that 



SELFISHNESS 



81 



human nature is incapable of a purely disinterested action, 
that all conduct resolves, in the last analysis, into selfnseek- 
ing. It is undeniable that selfishness generally prevails and 
is dominant. But let us distinguish between the actual and 
the potential, and heartily deny the impossibility of disinter- 
estedness. Nay more, let us hold that purely disinterested 
conduct has sometimes been actually experienced, and also 
observed, and that it is truly the culminating perfection, the 
realization of ideal humanity. 



§ 60. The thesis is presented in the following questions : 
Why is it that the affections, the giving desires, have a right- 
ful supremacy over the appetites and appetencies, the craving 
desires ? Why is it that the moral law enjoins the practice 
of affections, impulses to benefit others, and forbids the in- 
dulgence of impulses craving a gain for self as an end ? The 
reason lies deep in human nature. 

Let it be granted that all constitutional desires have natu- 
ral and therefore rightful aims, and should harmonize, thus 
sustaining each other in their normal functions. Also, that 
craving and giving are contraries, whence a conflict between 
appetency and affection, which two therefore do not accord 
but are in constant and inevitable discord, unless one become 
subservient to the other. That our desires should be brought 
into functional harmony, will hardly be denied. That this 
harmony can be attained only by the subservience of one or 
the other class, is evident. Which is entitled to supremacy ? 

Now suppose affection be made to subserve interest. What 
is the consequence ? The impulse to benefit another is ob- 
scured under the impulse to benefit self. I treat my friend 
with apparent and professed affection, using the manner and 
language of friendship, my real intent being to obtain for 
myself a gain. Perhaps I indulge my generous impulses in 
order to cultivate my generosity, a virtue I desire to possess 



82 OBLIGATION 

in myself. Evidently this is egoism or selfishness doubly re- 
fined, and therefore doubly odious. I degrade my friend 
into a mere means for my own profit, and so dishonor and 
wrong him. I do it under the form, and name, and profession 
of love, when in reality it is the contrary, base, self-seeking 
hypocrisy. If there be one character the most despicable of 
all, it is the hypocrite, he whom our Lord denounces in his 
most scathing terms. 

But such procedure is something more than hypocrisy. 
It is the extinction of half of one's nature, of his affections. 
For, if I confer a benefit on my neighbor solely in order to 
benefit myself, this does not merely subject love to interest, 
since love is then no longer love, but simply interest. Love 
has ceased to be, and I am wholly, exclusively selfish. This 
is not the subordination and subservience of affection to 
appetency, but the complete suppression and extinction of 
affection. A large part of the normal nature of the man dis- 
appears, and he stands in opposition to all his fellows. It is 
universal war ; every man's hand against every other. Surely 
this is not the way to personal excellence, to perfection of 
character. Surely this violates the law. It is amazing that 
many moralists should hold it obligatory to cultivate our 
affections to the end that we may thereby perfect our own 
personality, thus advocating a principle which would result 
in the extinction of affection, and produce a character abso- 
lutely selfish. 

§ 61. Suppose, on the contrary, the craving desires be 
made subject to the affections. What follows? Are they 
likewise extinguished ? Not at all. It is easy to understand 
how my appetency may, without loss, be made to subserve 
the ends of affection, craving various objects, not for my own 
sake as the end, but for the sake of those on whom I would 
bestow my energies and gains. Thus I may seek pleasure as 



SELFISHNESS 83 

a recreation, as a means of refreshing my powers for more 
efficient service. I may strive, with great earnestness and 
activity, to acquire property and increase my wealth, not 
from the miser's desire to possess, nor the voluptuary's desire 
to enjoy, but in order that I may bestow on others the bene- 
fits wealth commands, reserving for myself only such portion 
as is needful for further beneficence. I may cultivate my 
intellect, not for the sake of proficiency, but of efficiency. 
Further illustration is superfluous. But let us add, I may 
desire power in order to greater usefulness ; and I may desire 
reputation, the esteem of my neighbors, or even fame, simply 
because my influence in favor of the welfare of others is 
therein extended. Evidently the craving desires may crave 
in order to give, that is, they may become entirely subject to 
the affections, and so far from being extinguished, they are 
thereby refined and ennobled, and their activity enlarged. 

We conclude that, since the subjection of the affections 
would quench them, but the subjection of the appetencies 
would advance them, the affections have rightful supremacy. 
Furthermore it follows that the right growth of character 
consists largely in this subjection of selfish propensities to 
the unselfish, and in so directing the former that they be no 
longer interested, but disinterested. 

If it be objected that there are occasions for the exercise 
of affection, and other occasions for self-indulgence, the 
answer is easy. The claims of near relatives, of friends, 
of neighbors, of country, of mankind, of God, upon my means 
and energies, are paramount and exhaustive. Paramount, 
because these are dues, debts, duties, to be paid before self- 
gratification ; exhaustive, since the totality of a devoted life 
fails to requite their righteous demands. Hence no hour, no 
dollar is my own to spend upon myself alone, regardless of 
my overwhelming indebtedness, of my unremitting and end- 
less obligations. 



84 OBLIGATION 

It must be allowed that the scheme of character and con- 
duct here proposed, is ideal, a high ideal, unattained and 
unattainable by any man. It calls for a declaration of truce- 
less and internecine war upon selfishness. But selfishness so 
interpenetrates, in its many subtle forms and sacred guises, 
the human soul, interweaving its delicate fibers and gilded 
threads throughout our better nature, that to unravel and 
wholly displace it seems impossible. The best of men, those 
morally most refined, are still more or less influenced by 
selfish propensities, and occupied with self-seeking. But to 
approximate, as nearly as may be, the moral ideal, is the true 
struggle of a noble life. 



SERVICE 85 



CHAPTER X 

SERVICE 

§ 62. The three expressions of the law already considered, 
Trespass not, Be jnst, Do duty, upon a liberal yet fair inter- 
pretation, taking each in both its positive and its negative 
sense, are evidently coextensive and have the same content. 
This will be allowed. But their common extension may per- 
haps be understood to be limited to the obligation to do no 
harmful injury to another, either positively by direct aggres- 
sion, or negatively by reserve of what he may justly demand. 
Practically most persons take this view, holding that, if one 
commit no hurtful trespass, pay promptly his manifest dues, 
be just in thought and deed, by this simple innocence his 
obligations are completely fulfilled. Many a man holds him- 
self acquitted before the tribunal of his own moral judgment, 
before that of his fellow men, and of his final judge, pro- 
vided he can truly say he has committed no wrong, meaning 
thereby that he has done no violence to patent rights, and 
awarded to every one his established claims. This seems to 
have been substantially the doctrine of the Stoics. It is a 
high estimate of duty, and one rarely accomplished. Never- 
theless, if the notion be thus limited, it is safe to affirm there 
are obligations higher than duty. But the indicated limita- 
tion is by no means clear, the line cannot be sharply drawn, 
and hence it is better to extend the notion of duty to include 
these higher and wider obligations. 

Recurring to the moral principle, a man* has a right to 
gratify his normal desires, we observe that not merely the 



86 OBLIGATION 

acquiescence, but the assistance, of his fellows, is essential 
to this gratification. No man can live for himself alone. 
Apart from his natural longing for social intercourse, there 
are necessities that can be supplied only by the concurrence 
of those around, and in addition to necessities, there are many 
native and normal wants that require the cooperation of 
others. Here, then, is a just claim upon their assistance, 
upon their service. It is his right, and if withheld, he suf- 
fers trespass. The service cannot be compulsory, from lack 
of power, except in rare cases, and therefore must be free, 
willing service. Now rights are reciprocal. If some one 
have a rightful claim upon some other for free service, then 
this other has a like claim upon him ; not, however, by way 
of repayment, of compensation, but because such claim is 
original with either. Hence no man may live for himself 
alone. Every one is morally bound to render, within certain 
limits, willing service to his fellow men. It is due them ; 
free, willing service is duty. 

§ 63. The obligation to render mutual service is univer- 
sally recognized among men. In all the relations of life, this 
duty, though so imperfectly fulfilled and often grossly vio- 
lated, is nevertheless judged by all to be binding on all, and 
its observance to be an essential part of righteous living. 
The prompting of instinct, antecedent to moral inference, is 
decisive in the matter. Imagine an extreme case. Suppose 
yourself standing on the brink of deep water in which a 
stranger is drowning, and it needs only that you reach out 
your hand to save him. Ought not you to do it ? If you 
withhold the hand, and disregarding his cries for help and 
his manifest need, allow him to drown, would not your in- 
action be instinctively self-condemned and condemned by all 
as inhuman ? Suppose him to be your friend, or your only 
brother ; and, further, suppose that by letting him drown you 



SERVICE 87 

shall obtain the whole instead of half the inheritance ; would 
not even hesitation be intensely vile ? Ought not a man to 
help his brother, his father, his mother, his child, his neigh- 
bor, his fellow man ? There is but one answer in any candid 
mind, but one among all cultured peoples. 

Again, let us suppose the drowning man to be known as a 
worthless vagabond, or even as a dangerous criminal whose 
death would be a blessed relief to his family, and to society 
— let him drown? No. Is it to give him time to repent 
and reform ? Hardly. Suppose him, on the contrary, to be 
a godly man, afflicted with painful incurable disease, a dis- 
tressing burden to himself, and to everybody else — let him 
drown? No. Stretch forth thy hand. Help, in the name 
of common humanity. The obligation of helpfulness has no 
other condition. It is binding in every personal relation. 
Setting aside the differences in concrete cases, there remains 
the common, imperative principle : Thou shalt serve. 

We have here another form of the law, but let it be ob- 
served, not another law. The law is one. The several forms 
may be viewed as progressing in comprehension, the second 
including the first, but wider, and so on, until this last ex- 
pands to embrace the larger duty of man. That it includes 
the others is evident, for he who rightly serves will not 
trespass, and will pay his just dues. But it is preferable to 
interpret each as coextensive with the others, only presenting 
a different phase. Thus it may fairly be regarded as a tres- 
pass, as injustice, as undutiful to withhold helpful service, 
the moral law being comprised and expressed in the formula : 
Serve thy fellows. 

§ 64. To serve is to promote the welfare of another. He 
who does this is a servant. The term as applied to menials 
has acquired rather a bad sense, especially when the service 
is compulsory, and the cognate word servile is distinctly 



88 OBLIGATION 

opprobrious. But no bad sense, indeed only the contrary, 
colors the notion of voluntary service, and of this we are 
speaking. To serve is to confer a benefit, and he who does 
this is a benefactor. A teacher is a servant, though we call 
him a master. He is a servant directly of his pupils, indi- 
rectly of his employers, of the public, of posterity. Poli- 
ticians proclaim themselves servants of the people, which 
truly is their office, though the profession be insincere. 
Husband and wife, parent and child, mutually subserve each 
other's interests. 

A servant is a minister, and this is a title of honor. Min- 
isters of religion are servants of the Church, and as such are 
justly honored and reverenced. To become a Minister of 
State is to attain the highest official rank. The Prime Min- 
ister of Great Britain holds a place of exalted dignity. The 
motto of the Prince of Wales, descending to him from the 
Black Prince, is Hdj trim, I serve, and perhaps no heraldic 
cognizance is more widely known, or more frequently quoted. 
A king on his throne is rightly the servant of his subjects ; 
and the very King of kings pronounced himself a lowly ser- 
vant, coming not to be ministered unto but to minister, and 
because of his humble service to humanity, he has the highest 
throne. 

All service implies sacrifice. In reaching forth my hand 
to save a drowning brother, there is some expenditure of 
mental and neural energy, perhaps not measurable, but real. 
No service can be rendered without sacrifice, without giving, 
imparting what is in one's keeping. Hence the law of ser- 
vice is a law of sacrifice. Culture, in general, is preparation 
for yielding a return ; specifically, as the cultured field is capa- 
ble of yielding fruits, so the cultivated man is one prepared, 
by what he has acquired, to render services. When a sacri- 
fice is complete and directed to a noble end, we call it heroic. 
The very essence of heroism is the entire sacrifice of self for 



SERVICE 89 

the sake of others. It is the object of unbounded admiration 
and praise. In ancient days it became distinctly a cult. 
But heroes and hero worship are not peculiar to antiquity, 
for always and everywhere the heart of humanity responds 
to the call. The heroic sacrifice of the great servant of all 
is commanding, not merely the admiration, but the adoration 
of mankind. 

§ 65. The constant service demanded by moral law is not 
to be indiscriminate. One is not to serve all others equally. 
Our obligations to our fellows vary very greatly in extent. 
To near relatives we are bound for more service than to those 
further removed ; first, because the possibilities are greater ; 
secondly, because service creates debt, and where intercourse 
is intimate the exchange of benefactions is more frequent; 
and thirdly, because in certain cases, as of husband and wife, 
the minute interdependence calls for minute reciprocation. 
The extent of obligation is to be judged by the law of tres- 
pass. My service is due to one in so far as I do not thereby 
trespass on the rightful claims of some other. I may, for 
example, distribute my fortune in alms so widely as to violate 
the rights of my children. Likewise I am bound to promote 
the general welfare of the state only in so far as I do not 
thereby trespass on the rights of individual citizens, or of 
neighboring states, either by encroachment, or by transferring 
to either the service due to the other. 

Moreover, it should be particularly observed that the alien 
service required does not preclude the agent from participat- 
ing in the benefit conferred. When a man labors for the 
welfare of his family without thinking of or caring for his 
own individual profit, still, as a member of the family, he 
shares in the beneficence. When one serves the community 
or his country, either by promoting or by defending the com- 
mon interests, it is evident that, since the interests are 



90 OBLIGATION 

common, he thereby enlarges his own liberty, and guards his 
own well being. If he does these things selfishly, himself 
his end, then he meanly degrades his family, his country, so 
far as in his power lies, to merely useful means ; which treat- 
ment is unworthy, is a trespass, whatever be the result. But 
if, with no thought of his own interest or gain, he does those 
things unselfishly, making perhaps many painful personal 
sacrifices, still he shares in the beneficial results, is repaid 
and rewarded ; and even should his efforts fail, he neverthe- 
less enjoys the satisfaction of disinterested intent. Moral 
law does not prohibit any one from acting in a way that shall 
benefit himself, but only from thus acting in order that he 
may benefit himself. 

These modifying considerations forestall the criticism usu- 
ally and justly applied to strict altruism, that if every one 
should be constantly sacrificing his own welfare for that of 
others, there would be no permanent recipient of benefaction, 
and the perfection of morality on this basis would be not 
only a universal disregard of welfare, but also its annihila- 
tion. But according to the modified altruism of the present 
treatise, moral law does not call for such absolute self-sacri- 
fice, for the extinction of the natural and healthful desire for 
one's own welfare. It forbids this only as a personal end ; 
and the gratification of the desire is provided for, in the 
economy of human nature, by the community of interests, so 
that whatever promotes the welfare of another redounds to 
the benefactor; for, although, in the existing disorder of 
society, the objective return fail entirely, still the subjective 
sanction is abundant reward. 

§ 66. In view of the right to service arises the question, 
in what manner and to what extent may one use another 
person. According to Kant, never as a means, but only as 
an end. He says: "The foundation of this principle is: 



SERVICE 91 

Rational nature exists as an end in itself. . . . Accordingly 
the practical imperative will be as follows : So act as to treat 
humanity, whether in thine own person or in that of another, 
in every case as an end withal, and never as a means only." 
He argues that to make use of another person as a means 
whereby to accomplish one's end, degrades him from a person 
into a mere thing, thus violating his dignity, his worth as a 
man. Since this is to wrong him grievously, he should be 
treated only as an end in himself. 

The doctrine is striking, and with qualification it is true. 
We should never use another as a means, unless with his 
own full knowledge and free consent. If, without this, I 
myself be used as a mere tool, then, on discovering it, I am 
indignant, feeling I have been treated unworthily, degraded 
and wronged, according to the measure of the abuse. But 
with the consensus of all parties, the using each other as 
means to rightful ends is justifiable. Indeed, the greater part 
of the amenities of life, the enjoyment and benefit of social 
intercourse, kindness, politeness, could not otherwise exist. 
Such reciprocal use does not degrade, it ennobles; and by 
consenting to become an instrumental means, one becomes a 
participant in beneficence. This privilege of using others is 
limited also to rightful ends. One may never seek to use 
another even with consent in a way or to an end that is 
wrong ; for this would be inducing him to become a partner 
in wrong doing, which would be doing him a wrong. The 
point in Kant's doctrine that I should make myself in mine 
own person an end, we have previously rejected as the essence 
of egoism. On the contrary, I ought ever and actively to 
constitute myself an intelligent and willing means to the 
welfare of others, which is altruism. 

§ 67. A very important corollary from the general doc- 
trine of obligatory service is stewardship. Since unintermit- 



92 OBLIGATION 

ting service is due from each one to others, according to his 
relations," it follows that his time, his energy, his ability, his 
capital, his estate, whatever he may have in possession or 
acquire, is in reality not his own, but the property of those 
others, and he himself is their steward. The transient in- 
fluence one may have on his surroundings, his daily walk and 
conversation, his health of mind and body, his life itself as 
the basis of all, these are held in trust, and are to be devoted 
to the well being of his fellow men! They are the owners; 
he, their agent. All is due, all is debt, ever paying, never 
paid. Not less is comprehended in the law of service. 

We are bound, as trustees, not merely for the keeping, 
but also for the increase, the accumulation of our holdings. 
One's talents, whether of gold, silver or iron, of brain, brawn, 
bone, of intellect, sensibility, will, are all, whether great or 
small, to be put to usury, and a strict account rendered. 
The servant who kept his Lord's pound laid up in a napkin 
was condemned as a wicked servant. Possessions are to be 
used, and used rightly, imbursed and disbursed, as dictated 
by the law of service, which demands a continuous distribu- 
tion of our gifts. 

A further corollary is the obligation to guard and to de- 
fend possessions. Obviously one is bound to secure what is 
intrusted to his keeping against all comers, otherwise he can- 
not fulfill the obligation to use it in alien service. Guardian- 
ship is itself a service, since it preserves for others their 
property, which preservation is, indeed, a very necessary part 
of the general service due. Hence my rights are to be 
watchfully and zealously guarded. The property in my 
hands must be carefully protected, to prevent any trespass. 
My personal liberty must be maintained free from unwar- 
ranted interference. My bodily welfare, and especially my 
life must be courageously defended against hurtful and 
deadly violence. The powerful instinct of self-preservaticn 



SERVICE 93 

indicates the sacred duty of self-defense, and the original 
impulse of natural affection shows the no less sacred duty of 
defending the lives intrusted to our care. Violence must be 
repelled, if need be, by counter violence. But defense 
should not be allowed to pass over, as it strongly tends to 
do, into mere vengeance. The impulse to revenge is a male- 
volent desire, and hence abnormal, and hence unjustifiable. 
Yet retaliation is sometimes the best and indeed the only 
means of effective defense, in which case it is duty. 

§ 68. We can imagine a life conducted throughout accord- 
ing to the principles thus far expounded. One might con- 
ceivably be governed, in general and in particular, by a 
sense of duty, duty being here taken in the limited meaning 
of outward obedience to the law of trespass, justice and ser- 
vice, inspired by respect for the law, recognized as demand- 
ing thus much but no more. The whole life being one of 
innocence and beneficence, duty is said to be perfectly ful- 
filled by this external conformity to the law simply out of 
respect for the law, a profound reverence for all pervading 
moral obligation, and this alone is what should determine all 
human conduct. 

The rigorism of this stoical doctrine is impressive and 
imposing. It is a severe and noble conception of duty, a 
high ideal. But observe, it does not merely disregard the 
affections ; it requires their suppression. If we judge a man 
to be governed in all his conduct by a sense of duty, fulfill- 
ing carefully, anxiously, assiduously his many obligations, 
living a life of sacrificial service, purely because of respect 
for the law of duty, we are filled with admiration for so lofty 
a character ; but if we judge him at the same time destitute 
of love, we admire him as we admire an iceberg. There is 
an instinctive repugnance to a person human, yet not hu- 
mane. And if we find he has laboriously extinguished the 



94 OBLIGATION 

yearnings of natural affection in favor of an overruling and 
exclusive conception of absolute duty, we turn from him as 
from a monstrous and repulsive prodigy. 

The sense of duty, rising high but stopping with good 
works, fails to fulfill the law's demands. In the moral ideal 
of humanity, there is something higher than this rigid stoi- 
cism. Were I sick and suffering, and did my friend serve 
me merely from a sense of duty, I should be displeased, I 
would tell him to begone, I will hire a nurse. Is it suffi- 
cient for a father to guard and promote the welfare of his 
child simply out of respect for his rational obligation? Shall 
a mother tend her babe with all the wonderful, beautiful 
solicitude and ready self-sacrifice that wins our adoration, 
merely because she knows she ought so to do ? No, there 
is a higher, nobler impulse, maternal love. Should a hus- 
band and wife serve each other merely from a sense of duty, 
it would be a just cause of dissatisfaction, and perhaps of 
disunion. The conception of duty, enlarged beyond inno- 
cence to include beneficence, comes short of obligation. If 
it be thus limited, then it is legality, not morality, and again 
there is something higher than duty, something nobler than 
service. We heartily reject a scheme of ethics implying 
that a man is under no obligation to love his mother or his 
country, but should purify his character by eliminating all 
such inclinations ; a scheme that clearly, distinctly enacts : 
Thou shalt not love thy neighbor. 



CHARITY 95 



CHAPTER XI 

CHARITY 

§ 69. An argument already offered, having its basis in the 
general principle that the natural or constitutional powers 
of man ought to fulfill their normal functions, or, more spe- 
cifically, that every one has a right to gratify his normal 
desires, a right being a duty, concludes the appetites and 
appetencies to be auxiliary to the affections, which are thus 
normally supreme. From this it was directly inferred that 
self cannot rightly be an end. With equal cogency it is 
implied that the object of affection is the normal and right- 
ful end of all endeavor. In other words, the affections, 
included under the general name love, are obligatory ; they 
ought, in due manner and measure, to be gratified. The 
moral law, found in the original and innermost nature of 
man, enjoins that he love his fellow man. 

Consider the meaning of affection, love, charity, benevo- 
lence, these terms being taken synonymously. Love is a 
desire, an impulse or inclination toward others, disposing 
one to give out from his own resources what may benefit 
them. Let it be kept clearly in mind that love is strictly a 
desire. It should not be confused with volition, though the 
synonym, benevolence, partakes, etymologically, of the voli- 
tion; for love is simply the causative antecedent of the 
volitional endeavor. It is not a feeling, though attended 
by peculiar feelings ; being neither an emotion, though the 
name is commonly applied to its attendant emotions ; nor a 
sentiment, though the sentiments that normally accompany 
it act and react powerfully to stimulate the desire. Love is 



96 OBLIGATION 

properly and definitely a desire, relative to a sentient object, 
whose welfare it would promote. 

§ 70. Ye have heard that it hath been said by them of 
high authority, Love cannot be commanded, for it is an 
affection, and not a volition which alone is subject to com- 
mand. But love, benevolence, charity, pathological love, 
as distinguished from practical love which is not properly 
love but willing service, can be commanded ; though truly it 
is an affection, becoming active only as the subject is affected 
by an amiable object, that is, an object susceptible of wel- 
fare. For, although every command is primarily addressed 
to the will, yet the will, having, by means of voluntary atten- 
tion, indirect control of all the mental faculties, carries out 
the command, if not thwarted by passion, in impressing its 
subordinates into the required order. Otherwise the sub- 
jective springs of conduct could have no moral quality. 
Even belief, a feeling of assurance, of conviction, is com- 
manded in the presence of truth ; and the command is obeyed, 
and the feeling is induced, by giving attention, sincere heed, 
to the presented truth. Love, charity, a desire for another's 
welfare, may likewise be commanded in the presence of 
amiability, and the command obeyed, the affection induced, 
by giving like heed to the amiable capacity of the object. 
Hence the love of benevolence can be commanded, since it 
can be voluntarily induced, nourished and invigorated. 

Not only can this love be commanded, but it is com- 
manded. The moral law is embedded in and arises from the 
very constitution of human nature. Desires awakened by 
objects and guided by intelligence are the motives of volun- 
tary conduct. We have seen that among these the affections 
are normally supreme, rightly subjecting all other motive 
impulses to their ends. Therefore we find that, in order to 
fulfill their natural functions, the affections must have not 



CHABITT 97 

merely free but preeminent exercise, and that this is essen- 
tially the supreme law of humanity demanding reverent 
obedience. 

§ 71. The affections having different objects, have re- 
ceived various names ; as, conjugal, parental, filial and 
fraternal love, friendship, kindness, patriotism, philanthropy. 
In each of these the affection varies both in kind and degree. 
The differences in kind are due to differences in the rela- 
tions. The differences in degree are regulated by the pos- 
sibilities. We are not bound to love all others equally, this 
being unnatural. Many ties, many obligations. Those most 
nearly related are bound to love each other with a special 
ardor ; as, parents and children. 

The sentiment of gratitude excites love for a benefactor 
or neighbor. It enters largely along with friendship and 
kindness into the forms and substance of true politeness, 
which is love in littles, and in all its grades is essential to 
high moral culture, and is ennobling. 

We are bound to love those whose character and conduct 
we abhor, cherishing the desire to remedy the evil in them, 
and otherwise to better them. We should love even a 
wicked and active enemy; righteous defensive resentment 
being quite consistent with the impulse to promote, not his 
evil way, but his well-being whenever opportunity offers or 
can be found, and in so far as we do not thereby trespass 
on some other. In civilized warfare after a victory the 
wounded abandoned by the defeated are cared for humanely. 
This is love to enemies ; we feel the obligation, and call it 
humanity. 

We are bound to love all men of all races, those in the 
remotest regions of the globe, our very antipodes, yes, and 
even the generation yet unborn, in a due manner and meas- 
ure. This is the obligation of philanthropy. 



98 OBLIGATION 

§ 72. Service fulfilling the law must be, not merely willing 
service, but loving service. We have seen that a life of 
sacrificial service, of active beneficence, determined only by 
respect for the law, fails of completeness. Though I be- 
stow all my goods to feed the poor, and have not charity, it 
profiteth me nothing. It is essential to duty that love be its 
spring. The service due is loving service. Let the duplex 
form of this phrase be noted. Loving is desiring, a subjec- 
tive motive ; it is benevolence, well-wishing. Service is 
acting, an objective motive ; it is beneficence, well-doing. 
Serving is the normal outcome, the natural consequent, of 
loving ; they are psychological correlatives. Neither is com- 
plete without the other. 

For, how is it possible that one should sincerely, willingly, 
intentionally endeavor to promote another's welfare, unless 
he desire the other's welfare ? All voluntary effort is con- 
ditioned on an antecedent desire, so that the command of 
intelligent, willing service is a command of intelligent, loving 
service. One cannot sincerely strive for another's welfare 
unless he desire it, and this is love. If it be said, the desire 
is simply to obey, we reply, a desire to obey a command to 
serve, is a desire to serve as commanded. 

On the other hand, how can there be love not followed by 
service ? As faith without works is dead, so also is love 
without service. If it have any life, it is at least ready and 
watchful of opportunity to serve. For generous love impels 
to service. He who loves will serve, will render willing, 
active, self-sacrificing service. Also he who loves will be 
just, will pay all dues, will not trespass. Bear ye one 
another's burdens, and so fulfill the law. Owe no man any- 
thing, save to love one another, this being the only debt that 
cannot be finally discharged ; for he that loveth another hath 
fulfilled the law. Love is the fulfillment of the law. 

All the various presentations of the moral law heretofore 



CHABITY 99 

considered, we now find to be summed in the law of loving 
service, Thou shalt love and serve. And indeed we see that 
even herein is superfluity, for the whole moral law, the total 
of human obligation, is completely and comprehensively 
summed in the single categorical imperative of one syllable, 
love. Thou shalt love, is the perfect law, the law of love. 

§ 73. Progress in moral culture consists in transforming 
fear into respect, and respect into love. With primitive char- 
acters, and even with many highly cultured otherwise, the fear 
of penalty is the chief, often the only, motive of obedience. 
To this may be added as one step higher, the hope of reward. 
In this is an appeal to the selfish propensities usually pre- 
dominant in crude humanity. They are not thereby ap- 
proved, but used to bring the man to at least outward 
obedience, a step toward inward culture. Thus the law is a 
pedagogue, leading men upward. 

A thoughtful consideration of one's relations, a clear recog- 
nition of the law in us, inspires respect for its mandate, and 
an impulse to observance. Herein is a passing away from 
the influence of threats and promises. These are lost to 
sight, and obedience is determined simply by respect for the 
law. The vast all-pervading sense of moral obligation, a 
wide comprehensive view of duty, an obedience to the law 
for its own sake superior to its sanctions, produces nobility 
and excellence in moral character. Yet this ideal is cold, 
hard, stern, repressing as weakness the natural play of tender 
sympathy, of generous sentiment, of warm inclination toward 
others, maintaining a stoical indifference to their weal or 
woe, and giving help exclusively out of respect for the law 
of service. As a scheme of morals, this cannot be purged of 
egoism, of selfishness ; for necessarily it holds that the so- 
called duties co self are equally or even more imperative than 
duties to another, those being the basis from which all other 
duties arise. 



U«* c ' 



100 OBLIGATION 

In the still higher ideal, cold respect for law is gradually, 
as culture progresses, replaced by charity, which is the bond 
of perfectness. As in the second grade the sanctions of the 
law are lost to sight, so in this highest grade the law itself 
disappears from view, and its requirements are fulfilled with- 
out reference to its mandate. It is the fruit of moral 
growth that both subjective and objective activities accord 
with the law, not because of its pressure, but because the 
order and harmony of the natural powers have been restored, 
and the man does what is right because his dominant im- 
pulses lead thereto, and his free preference finds therein his 
highest gratification. He renders loving service in due meas- 
ure to his fellow men, this having become the habit, the 
second nature of his being. He does by nature the things 
of the law, and having no law, is a law unto himself, showing 
the work of the law written in his heart. For love knows 
no law other than its own impulse. 

Obviously, in the economy of human nature, this progres- 
sion does not take place uniformly. A criminal at war with 
society at large may be dutiful to his family in other matters 
because of strong domestic affection, and in so far fulfill the 
law of love. The average good citizen knows little and 
cares less about the criminal code. Its enactments are not 
for him. He has not the slightest disposition to do what it 
forbids, and orders his actions without reference to it. The 
penitentiary, the jail, the gallows, have no terrors for him. 
The police, the courts, the judiciary, he recognizes as social 
machinery devised and maintained for the protection of his 
rights. They have no other meaning for him. He has risen 
above the great body of civil law, and is not, properly speak- 
ing, an obedient, but a law-abiding citizen who, without 
thought of the law, governs his conduct by his own cultured 
preferences. In his intercourse with friends and acquaint- 
ances, he may still have duties that are irksome and repug- 



CHABITT 101 

nant which he fulfills from a sense of duty, and therein feels 
the tense bonds of obligation. His further moral growth 
requires the enlarging and deepening of charitable sympa- 
thies, so that his conduct may be determined more and more 
by love, less and less by law ; doing always the right thing, 
not because he ought so to do, but because he wants to do 
just that thing rather than any other. 

§ 74. We have seen that so long as one acts merely from 
respect for the law, he is in bondage to the law. He has 
passed perhaps with many a fierce struggle out from a de- 
grading slavery to appetites and passions and unbridled lusts, 
for of what a man is overcome of the same is he also brought 
into bondage, into a voluntary and honorable bondage. His 
conduct becomes uniform, reduced to the order of facts that 
ought to be, regulated by principles conforming to moral 
law. This is a dignified attitude, a high and rare attain- 
ment. But the man is in bonds, rigid, inexorable, though 
honorable, bound under a law that knows no concession or 
relaxation. By many moralists this is called liberty. Surely 
it is not liberty, but strict, the strictest, bondage. It is 
moral necessity. Regulus said: I must return. Luther 
cried : I can do no otherwise. Where, then, is liberty, the 
perfect liberty for which man so ardently longs ? 

Evidently when one does more and more as the law 
requires, not by virtue of the obligation, but by virtue of 
his own native or cultured disposition, he is passing from 
under bondage into the realm of liberty. When love takes 
the place of constraining duty, the law ceases to be law. Then 
he is no longer under law, but under grace ; then, but not 
till then, is he perfectly free. The law commands, Thou 
shalt love ; and when through obedience love has become the 
dominating impulse, confirmed and established, the law as 
law has disappeared. Thus perfect love is perfect liberty. 



102 OBLIGATION 

Then all doing is righteous yet free, since it is done in 
free preference to any other. Here and here only is the 
longed for liberty to be found. In our imperfection and 
struggles with self, which never cease, this highest ideal is 
never fully realized in human life. The imperfect person 
is one conscious of obligation. The perfect person is one 
conscious of holiness. Perfect persons are not under law ; 
so that we may truly say the holy angels and the Deity are 
under no obligation to do what they do, but being perfect 
in love, are perfect in work, and perfect in liberty. Heaven 
knows no law. 



WELFARE 103 



CHAPTER XII 

WELFARE 

§ 75. The term welfare has been used in the foregoing 
discussion. The corresponding notion is of so great impor- 
tance in ethical theory as to require special examination. 

Many philosophers, both ancient and modern, hold that 
the total essence of well-being or welfare or happiness is 
pleasure. All activity, they say, resolves ultimately into 
seeking for pleasure and shrinking from pain, this being a 
necessary consequence of the original constitution of the 
animal man, fully explaining all his conduct, and determin- 
ing his character in its highest development. The maxi- 
mum of pleasure attained throughout life is the maximum 
of welfare. Pleasures are admitted to vary in quantity, and 
even in quality, the coarse enjoyment of brutal sensuality 
differing widely from the refined enjoyment of delicate sen- 
timent. Originally, according to the hypothesis of evolu- 
tion, all impulsion is brutally selfish ; gradually it becomes 
polished by its environment, but with no change of sub- 
stance. The doctrine is essentially egoistic. Benevolence, 
in its most generous forms, is explained by the pleasure it 
gives the benefactor, and a purely disinterested action is pro- 
nounced a psychological impossibility. 

Without renewing the objections to egoism, let it be here 
observed that pleasure and pain are qualities belonging to 
feeling only. They are not elements of desire or of its grat- 
ification, though indeed they accompany both. We often 
seek to gratify a desire utterly regardless of the attendant 
pleasure or pain, and hence these are not universal ends. 



104 OBLIGATION 

Moreover, pleasure and pain have in themselves no moral 
quality, they are neither right nor wrong. But if pleasure 
were the ultimate end of human endeavor, then it were 
ethical in the highest degree, and the maximum of pleasure 
attained would be the maximum of virtue ; which is absurd. 

It is freely admitted that there is a natural and hence uni- 
versal desire for pleasure and aversion to pain, the reverse 
being psychologically impossible. But pleasure as an object 
of desire is only one among a large number of appetencies, 
and it is not the chiefest or strongest or most prevailing, for 
there are others that often override it. Now it is evident 
that the gratification of one normal desire among many that 
are coordinate cannot constitute entire well-being ; for to 
this end there must be a measured, harmonized gratification 
of all native inclinations. Nor can desire for pleasure be, 
even obscurely, the constantly informing element of the 
other desires ; for very often we desire and ardently pursue, 
not pain itself, but what we know to be painful ; we take 
pains to reach a painful end, bitterly demanding satisfaction, 
and heartily accepting the poignant consequences. Hence 
pleasure, even should it be at a continuous maximum through- 
out life, cannot of itself be accounted welfare, though indeed 
in complete welfare it is an ever-present and important factor. 

Of course one may define welfare as a maximum of pleas- 
ure and discuss it accordingly ; but it is very certain that 
this is not the notion of welfare that prevails among men. 
No doubt the notion includes pleasure, but it includes much 
more ; for men condemn, as lacking dignity, a life whose 
sole aim is pleasure however refined. Who enjoys more 
delightful pleasure, according to De Quincey, than the 
opium-eater? Despite his delicious dreaming, he is judged 
a most pitiful wretch. Even he who devotes himself to 
giving pleasure to others, as the professional musician, is 
held in slight esteem. So also the comedian. Men enjoy 



WELFARE 105 

laughing, but the perpetually funny man is classed with the 
circus clown, a lineal descendant of the court jester, whose 
rank was low, and whose quips were regulated with whips. 
Still the pleasure giver has a calling, for pleasant recreation 
is needful to our welfare. But the mere pleasure seeker, 
studying his own enjoyment, not occasionally as a recreation 
but as the end of living, the devotee of social amenities, the 
professional sportsman, the dissipated spendthrift, the disso- 
lute libertine, each of these is even more justly reprobated, 
hardly for lack of wisdom in his way, rather for total lack of 
wisdom's way. A life of pleasure, whether generous or self- 
ish, even one of simple playful gayety apart from vice, is 
accounted a wasted life, and wise men take infinite pains to 
secure, through much self-denial, a regulated and sober 
welfare. 

§ 76. We are, then, in great need to know, clearly and 
distinctly, the meaning of welfare. In accord, with the fun- 
damental doctrine of this treatise, the following definition is 
proposed: Welfare is the gratification of normal desire. 
From this it follows that continuous welfare is the constant 
gratification of normal desires throughout a complete life. 
Its attainment calls for self-control, for a measured adjust- 
ment of incompatible gratifications, in order to harmony,, and 
to the maximum gratification of those desires that are natu- 
ral, normal and in accord with moral law. The primary 
principle is, a man has a right to gratify his normal desires, 
if he do not trespass. Hence he has a right to welfare ; but 
whether he will attain it or not depends on the intelligent 
regulation of his desires, together with the possibility of 
their gratification within the given limits. 

It has been pointed out that, taken concretely, virtuous 
conduct is conduct conformed to practical reason or con- 
science, and, taken abstractly, virtue is action in conformity 



106 OBLIGATION 

with moral law. Also it was observed that virtue implies a 
struggle against obstacles. Now, besides the subjective dif- 
ficulties of virtuous endeavor, the judging, choosing and 
striving for right life, there are practically numerous and 
great objective difficulties, external obstacles in circum- 
stances, that oppose one at every turn, preventing the com- 
plete gratification of virtuous longings. If the subjective 
intention and effort be accomplished, then, even though the 
objective result fail, the chief Condition of welfare is ful- 
filled, and its principal element provided. But to complete 
welfare, there must be an external realization of the subjec- 
tive virtuous intent. So it is that, in the actual warfare of 
life, though it chastens and strengthens, there is rarely, if 
ever, a complete realization of thorough-going welfare. 

Since we have defined welfare as the gratification of nor- 
mal desires, and have characterized virtue as being the effort 
to realize this gratification in loving service, it appears that 
one's welfare consists in seeking disinterestedly to promote 
the welfare of others, and that an earnest constant striving 
to reach this end comprises the sum total of obligation. It 
is attained on two parallels. First, as a prime condition, 
one should seek, directly and indirectly, by precept, by exam- 
ple, and by whatever influence he may rightly use, to culti- 
vate in his fellows a virtuous disposition, inducing generous 
impulses, and impressing the mandate, Go, and do thou 
likewise. Such education is due especially from parents to 
children, from teachers to pupils, from the enlightened civ- 
ilizer to the benighted barbarian. Secondly, he should 
strive to remove, in so far as practicable, the external obsta- 
cles to their welfare lying in the way of his fellows, espe- 
cially of those more nearly related to him ; and also to fur- 
nish out of his own resources all reasonable facilities for 
these others to do likewise, thus helping them to modify and 
arrange their circumstances favorably to their own righteous 



WELFARE 107 

ends. So doing, he shall himself, without thought of him- 
self, experience the working of that great natural law of 
human activity, It is more blessed to give than to receive. 

§ 77. It is now needful to inquire concerning happiness, 
of which nothing has heretofore been said. The term is 
very indefinite, and though in common use, there is difficulty 
in fixing its meaning. Sometimes we hear that happiness 
is continuous pleasure. If this be allowed, then happiness 
cannot be identified with welfare ; for, as we have seen, wel- 
fare is something more than pleasure. But, while pleasure 
is a large, and perhaps an essential ingredient in happiness, 
this also seems to have other elements. Then shall not 
happiness and welfare be identified? Not strictly; for, 
though surely there is an intimate connection between them, 
a distinction remains. It is the distinction of antecedent 
and consequent in causal relation. "Welfare consists in the 
constant gratification of right desires. Now, like as pleas- 
ure is the reflex or correlate of spontaneous and unimpeded 
energy exerted in any special case, so, in the general course 
of living, happiness is the reflex or correlate of virtuous and 
successful conduct. Thus welfare is antecedent, well-being 
consequent; the one is dynamic, the other static ; the one, 
prosperity, the other, happiness. 

There can be no doubt that happiness is universally re- 
garded as desirable in the highest degree. Whence it may 
be presumed that the desire for happiness is a subjective 
necessity, an established uniformity, a natural law in human- 
ity. Also it may be allowed that no man can forecast the 
particular circumstances that would make him happy. Yet 
it seems not impossible for practical ethics to lay down rules 
of conduct in accord with fundamental principles, which, if 
favored by environment and followed intelligently and per- 
sistently, should conduce to happiness. But only a brief 
theoretical consideration is herein admissible. 



108 OBLIGATION 

It appears, then, there are in general two necessary condi- 
tions of welfare and its consequent happiness, subjective 
observance of moral law, and objective environment favor- 
ing realization. The former is necessary, but insufficient. 
The inward satisfaction arising from a full discharge of obli- 
gation, is an essential and the chief element of happiness ; 
but untoward circumstances may so mar the felicity of a 
righteous worker that we deem him stricken, smitten of 
God, and afflicted. The most perfect man was a man of 
sorrows, suffering the contradiction of sinners against him- 
self. On the other hand, the full possession of health, 
wealth and honors does not in itself constitute welfare. 
Outward success only, like that of Alexander, what doth 
it profit a man ? There must be prosperity both within and 
without in order to welfare, and to its reflex, happiness. 

Also we observe that no one can hopefully make happi- 
ness, however much he may desire it, his immediate object. 
It is altogether out of direct reach. The only possible way 
to it is through its condition, welfare. Hence wisdom dis- 
regards happiness as an end, not looking beyond welfare, 
but seeking this as the end of all endeavor. . This attained, 
happiness results by a benign law of human nature ; well- 
being, the sanction of well-doing. A poet has said : Happi- 
ness is a wayside flower ; plucked, it withers in the hand ; 
passed by, it is fragrance to the spirit. 

Moreover, let it be especially observed that, still less can 
any one hopefully make his own personal happiness his end. 
It has been sufficiently shown that, one's own welfare de- 
pends on his seeking the welfare of others. Hence one's 
own happiness is found only in thus promoting that of 
others. Outward duty done for the sake of inward satisfac- 
tion, fails as duty and as satisfaction. The mother, who 
with much self-denial waits upon her sick babe merely be- 
cause, should the babe die from neglect, she could never for- 



WELFARE 109 

give herself and -would suffer the pangs of remorse, that 
mother is an egoist, and not the mother we adore. She may 
escape the pain, yet is unhappy, for this is not the outcome 
of maternal love. Self-seeking in any form is foredoomed to 
failure, for it lacks the perfect virtue which, forgetful of 
self, strives for the welfare of others. Living for one's own 
happiness is living for one's self ; and living for one's self is 
sure to be a failure. Living for loving service is living for 
others ; and living for others is the sure and only road to 
welfare, both theirs and ours, that welfare whose correlate 
is happiness, both theirs and ours. 

§ 78. Involved in the notion of welfare is the notion of 
good, a term so very ambiguous that its use has thus far 
been avoided. Good things are relatively or absolutely good. 
The relatively good are those not good in themselves, but 
only as a means to something beyond; as, riches. We seek 
them in order to attain those absolutely good, that is, such 
as are good in themselves, and not good for aught else ; as, 
luxuries. What is good for something else has value ; what 
is good in itself has worth. An end good in itself is an 
absolute end. 

Absolute ends are altogether subjective, found only in 
certain mental states of sentient beings, more especially of 
persons, who habitually seek some one end, and only occa- 
sionally others, as desirable. Ends vary in degrees of excel- 
lence, as good, better, best. The best, the highest aim of 
human activity, is termed the summum bonum. 

The determination of the absolute, the ultimate good, the 
summum bonum, as the end of all moral endeavor, was the 
primal problem of ancient ethics. The Hedonists found it 
in pleasure, the highest enjoyment of the present passing 
moment. The Epicureans also found it in pleasure, but 
posited the maximum of enjoyment extending throughout 



110 OBLIGATION 

life, and called this happiness. Plato solved the problem 
grandly by declaring that the highest ultimate good is not 
pleasure, nor wealth, nor knowledge, nor power, but is the 
greatest possible likeness to God, as the absolutely good. 
He taught that happiness depends on the possession of this 
moral beauty and goodness. Aristotle's ultimatum is happi- 
ness, but with a definition, already noted, that distinguishes 
it from pleasure, and is hardly exceptionable. The Stoics 
taught that the supreme end of life, the ultimate good, is 
virtue, that is, a life conformed to nature, the agreement of 
conduct with the all- regulating law of nature, the human 
with the divine will, whereby the sage combines in himself 
all the essential perfections of deity. We remark that each 
of these several doctrines is egoistic, finding the summum 
bonum, the ultimatum of moral endeavor, to be an attainment 
of the moral agent for and within himself. ' 

§ 79. In modern ethics investigation of the summum 
bonum is less prominent, and various and conflicting views 
are entertained. The utilitarians teach the right aim and 
end to be happiness, which is variously and hazily defined. 
This doctrine divides into egoism and altruism, according as 
the agent regards his own happiness as the end of his 
endeavor, or makes that of related persons its object. If the 
good of a particular person, himself or some other or others, 
be the aim, it is called individualism ; if the good of a com- 
munity at large be the aim, it is called universalism, which 
has as many forms as there are kinds of community ; for 
instance, social, national, or humanistic universalism. In 
seeking the good of a community the aim should be the 
greatest good of the greatest number. 

The dominant form of philosophical ethics at the present 
day seems to be evolutionism, which affirms that develop- 
ment, progress, prosperity, is the end of moral endeavor. 



WELFARE HI 

According to Spencer, that is good, in the widest sense, 
which serves to accomplish some purpose ; and the ultimate 
conscious purpose of all vital activity is the production or 
retention of pleasure, or the avoidance or removal of pain. 
According to Wundt there is a series of ethical ends, begin- 
ning with self -contentment and self-improvement, rising to 
social ends in public well-being and general progress, and 
terminating in humanistic ends, chiefly intellectual, which 
consist in the continuous improvement of mankind. 

In opposition to the foregoing empirical doctrines, is the 
extreme intuitionism of the Kantians, who make the absolute 
ethical end to lie in obedience, pure and simple, to the objec- 
tive moral law. Less extreme are the perfectionists, who 
make the supreme good to lie in excellence of moral charac- 
ter, which excellence they fail to define clearly, but hold 
that it is attained by the active exercise of the intellectual 
and sensitive nature under the presidency of reason. 

The present treatise teaches that the aim and end of life 
is the harmonious and complete development of the man, 
individually, socially, politically and religiously, each one 
devoting his constant and total activity to the welfare of his 
fellows in loving service, thus obeying the perfect law of 
love and liberty, and thus attaining, as an unsought conse- 
quence, both his own and their happiness. The ideal of an 
ultimate and absolute good is that of a complete organism 
whose members cooperate in entire harmony ; which implies 
the fulfilling by every organ of its normal functions, and 
hence the perfect wholeness of the organism. It denotes, 
negatively, the absence of all discord, of all impurity; posi- 
tively, the perfection of functional activity. In the moral 
sphere, each rational being is himself an organized whole, 
and also an organized member of wider organisms. Now, 
since in every organic whole each member is at once means 
and end to every other, the law of an intelligent organism 



112 OBLIGATION 

requires that each member become voluntarily an active 
imparting means, as well as a passive receptive end. Herein 
is the ideal of welfare, and the sphere of the moral law, 
which commands every man to seek, not his own, but 
another's weal. Its observance regards that wholeness 
which is the summum bonum. 

The correlative concomitant of wholeness or holiness is 
beatitude or blessedness. This is more than happiness, as 
holiness is more than virtue. Virtue implies a struggle, 
and a virtuous being is still under and continuously endeav- 
oring to conform to the law. But in holy beings there is no 
struggle, they are not under the law, but dwell in a realm of 
perfect love, liberty and bliss. 



DEITY 113 



CHAPTER XIII 

DEITY 

§ 80. The existence of God is a postulate of Ethics. A 
speculative system may be evolved from the mere conception 
of a deity, a conception such as is found, with many modifi- 
cations and varying in degree from obscure to clear, in every 
human mind. But a true ethical theory, thoroughly estab- 
lished as a correct representation of its matter, to be complete 
and fully rounded out in accord with the demands of philo- 
sophical system, must posit as essential, not merely the con- 
ception, but the reality of Deity. We might adopt, relative 
to ethical system, the saying of Voltaire that " if God did 
not exist, it would be necessary to invent him ; but all nature 
cries out to us that he does exist." 

In modern times the attempt has been made, especially by 
the Comteists, to devise a system of humanitarian ethics, 
shutting out even the thought of God. To give such scheme 
philosophic unity and completeness,, its authors have been 
necessitated to find a common end for all lines of moral activ- 
ity, and they propose the general welfare of Humanity. 
This Humanity is personified, and set up as an object of rev- 
erence, and even of worship. Or the deity recognized in 
the affairs of the world is " the Stream of Tendency that 
makes for righteousness," which is "the Eternal, not our- 
selves." A modified view substitutes " the Unknowable," 
which, notwithstanding the negation, is defined to be " forma- 
tive force, working according to its inner necessity." But 
it is very certain that a generalized abstraction, rhetorically 
personified by a capital letter, will never satisfy the minds 



114 OBLIGATION 

and hearts of men, nor even meet the demands of a godless 
philosophy. Such proposed end of human endeavor is at 
most either a logical generalization, gathering up in an ab- 
stract formula the moral causes manifest in secular history, 
or an enfeebled pantheism. True ethical theory, however, 
arises, not from impersonal generalities, but from individual 
men and combinations of rational beings in their actual rela- 
tions ; not from intellectual abstractions, but from concrete 
realities the most vivid and stern. 

One point may be particularly noticed. Ethical schemes 
that do not recognize a personal sovereign Deity are unable 
to provide for the perfect administration of justice ; they find 
no court of appeal beyond the consensus of men. Now, 
from the patriarchal day of Job until this late and enlight- 
ened day of ours, it has been and still is the common convic- 
tion of thoughtful observers that the distribution of rewards 
and punishments, the avenging of wrongs, the adjustment of 
claims, in the historical life of our race, fail of righteousness. 
But such is the profound faith of mankind in the ultimate 
triumph of the principle of universal justice that this further 
conviction prevails : There must of necessity be a supreme 
court of appeal which shall, in an after life, administer retri- 
bution, vindicate justice, and establish righteousness. Unless 
there be such provision, there is no ground for faith in the 
unity and supremacy of moral law. 

§ 81. The ethical theory herein proposed posits as essen- 
tial the real existence of a personal Deity. The one eternal 
God, from everlasting to everlasting, the almighty maker of 
the world, himself a spirit and the father of our spirit, the 
founder and center of all truth, the supreme ruler and final 
judge, unfailing in strict justice while abounding in tender 
mercy, a perfect person conscious of holiness and ruling in 
love — he it is on whom an intelligent faith rests as the 



DEITY 115 

original source of authority, as legislator, judge and executor 
in one, who shall finally perfect all righteousness. 

To those objecting to the anthropomorphic character of 
this conception, a sufficient reply is that no other kind of 
notion is possible to the human mind. For us God is thus, 
or he is not. Holding this to be the true conception does 
not degrade the Deity to the human rank, but lifts the 
human to the divine. He has made us in his image, a little 
lower than divinity, that in his likeness we may become par- 
takers in his glory. 

Should it be objected that the introduction of a supernatu- 
ral element into an explanation of natural phenomena is 
unscientific, we admit this to be true of physical science, 
which is concerned with second causes only, having no re- 
course to a first cause. Bacon in Iris Organum, and Newton 
in his Principia, make frequent and devout reference to the 
Deity, though not as a factor in their systems ; but Laplace, 
it is said, when asked by Napoleon why he made no reference 
to God in his Mechanique Celeste, replied : Sire, I had no 
need of that hypothesis. So the physics of to-day very prop- 
erly makes no mention of the Deity. But in metaphysics 
the chief problem is the existence of God. Ethics, which 
also is not a science of material nature, but of human nature, 
of man on his spiritual side, in like manner transcends 
physics. It treats exclusively of mental states and acts, of 
phenomena of the soul or spirit. The facts on which its 
theory is based are subjective facts of direct observation by 
introspection, which are combined with inferences from them 
and from observed external activities. Here we are wholly 
within the spiritual sphere. A clear distinction may be 
made, by a difference in degree, between the human and the 
superhuman, but who shall draw the line between the natu- 
ral and the supernatural ? To posit in the spiritual sphere 
a, supreme personal spirit, so far from being unscientific, is 



116 OBLIGATION 

simply to complete the content of the sphere with a substance 
and its attributes, with the conscious personality of a rational 
being, in kind like to that which gives rise to the theory ; 
and therefore this complementing of the scheme is strictly 
scientific. 

§ 82. The ground from which the doctrine of this treatise 
has thus far been developed, is the natural constitution of 
man. His several powers of intellect and will, his emotional 
capacity, and the impulse to activity in his motive desires, 
have each a normal and cooperative function. Herein is dis- 
cerned the principle that it is right to gratify normal desire, 
together with the supreme law of humanity commanding the 
constant order of facts that ought to be, the single impera- 
tive of trespass, duty, justice or loving service. Now, it may 
reasonably be asked whether the common constitution of 
human beings is to be regarded as an ultimate ground, an 
original source of obligation, beyond which there is no 
determinant. 

Positivism answers affirmatively, which consists with its 
rigid empiricism. But we have tried to show that there is 
for us something more than experience. Evolutionism finds 
an antecedent determinant in the environment, a combina- 
tion of second causes, under whose influence the human con- 
stitution has been developed. But when we consider the 
great variety of environment to which the several races of 
mankind have been subjected, we should expect, on this 
view, to find a corresponding variety of constitution, and 
consequent varieties of moral law ; whereas, however great 
the variations in degree especially of intelligence, and the 
variety of constructions built upon the law, still, throughout 
history and everywhere, mankind is one, and the law is one. 

This essentially permanent uniformity points distinctly 
to an origin for the human constitution in a cause beyond 



DEITY 117 

itself and its environment, and, on the principle of like effect 
like cause, to a common cause, to a unity in the originating 
cause. The existence of an omnipotent and consistent 
maker and ruler, is the only satisfactory explanation of these 
significant facts that has been or can be offered, and this 
explanation alone fulfills the demand of ethical theory. 

§ 83. Many theistic moralists hold that the will of God 
is the original and ultimate ground of obligation. He has 
made us as it hath pleased him, revealing his will in us, and 
in our relations to each other and to himself. A reverent 
interpretation of nature and of history enables us to under- 
stand his will more clearly, and to these he has added a 
distinct revelation of it in the holy scriptures. Had it 
pleased him to make us and our surroundings otherwise, or 
merely to issue different, even contrary, commandments, our 
obligations would have been different from what they are, 
since his express will is their sole, sufficient and final 
ground. 

That the will of God, however revealed, defines our obliga- 
tions is unquestionable. But we cannot regard his authority 
as decisive, if it be merely arbitrary ; for this view implies 
the possibility of contradictions that are revolting. Should 
he capriciously command lying, murder, theft, all heaven 
and earth would rebel. The doctrine unwittingly represents 
him as a tryant ruling by fear, liable to transient whims 
inverting right and wrong, disordering order, compounding 
felony, falsifying truth, thereby divesting his intelligent 
subjects of all reliable knowledge of himself and of his crea- 
tions. Such notion is psychologically, philosophically and 
logically absurd. 

We must look beyond the will of God for the ultimate 
determinant of obligation, into that which determines his 
will, into his original, eternal, essential nature. Necessarily 



118 OBLIGATION 

and rightly we conceive of him as a spirit, having harmoni- 
ous attributes constituting his nature, in which is no vari- 
ableness nor shadow of turning. Being in himself the 
embodiment of truth, it is impossible for him to he ; being 
essentially just, he can never justify crime ; such self-contra- 
diction would dethrone him, would be the suicide of God. 
His omnipotence is not absolute, but limited to what accords 
with his nature, and his every action is confined to the strait 
and narrow way of righteousness. The macrocosm, the 
world, " answering his fair idea," conforms in the fixed 
material laws to his unchanging essence, and the uniformity 
of nature is the faithfulness of God. The microcosm, man, 
the express image of his person, is formed to conform in the 
fixed moral law to the same unchanging essence, and the 
oneness of justice is the righteousness of God. It is not 
the will, but the nature of the Deity that is the original and 
ultimate ground of obligation. 

§ 84. The final problem in our obligation to each other 
is now readily solved. The prior examination of human 
nature found it constituted for a free and harmonious play 
of its powers in the exercise of loving service, and this was 
recognized as the sum of obligation. Further examination 
has disclosed that human nature is derived from and akin to 
the divine nature, so that in promoting the welfare of each 
other, men are conforming to the divine will arising from 
the divine nature. The maker and ruler has given to every 
man more or less ability to promote the common welfare, and 
holds him accountable for its exercise. Whoever unwar- 
rantably interferes with this service trespasses both on the 
servant and on the served, and thereby violates the divine 
will and nature. Much has been said about the divine 
right of kings. Every man's right is a divine right ; both 
because of its origin, and because it involves the right of the 



DEITY 119 

Deity himself. Hence the sacredness of human rights, and 
the paramount obligation to respect them. Arising from the 
very nature of God, they are invariable, inalienable, irrevo- 
cable, grounded in eternal justice and truth, and he who 
would violate them is at war with the inflexible Almighty. 

Along with our obligation to each other is our obligation 
to God. To him is due, in the most comprehensive sense, 
loving service. We are bound to love God for his own sake, 
and all others for God's sake. The recognition of him as 
our personal creator and ruler, and of our obligation to him 
as his creatures and subjects, leading to adoration, is religion, 
the binding of man to God. Thus ethics expands over reli- 
gion by comprehending the author of our being, the father 
of our spirit, the eternal One from whom all our obligations 
arise, and in whom all our obligations end. He desires all 
that is disorderly to become orderly, and calls upon his 
rational free creatures to gratify, so far as in them lies, this 
desire ; hence it is hardly too much to say that our conduct 
affects the welfare and happiness of Our Father. To serve 
rightly our fellows for his sake, is to serve him ; and a tres- 
pass upon a fellow man is a trespass upon him. Moreover, 
he has a supreme right to our reverential worship, and omit- 
ting or neglecting it is using our freedom, which having 
given he will not revoke, to restrict his liberty in gathering 
up his due. 

Contemplating, inversely, the relation of God to man, we 
observe that the obligation is not properly reciprocal. We 
cannot think of the Deity as under any obligation, under 
any law, under anything ; for this contradicts his essentially 
absolute supremacy and sovereignty. But while it cannot 
correctly be said that he is bound to be steadfast in purpose, 
and faithful in promise, it is very certain that he will be 
thus, and all that is righteous, because of his ultimate 
nature. Now, as the universality of physical, psychical and 



120 OBLIGATION 

ethical law indicates his unity, so does the total content of 
ethical law, loving service, indicate his benevolence. He 
seeks the welfare and consequent happiness of his sentient 
creatures in his own constant loving service of them, both 
by direct providence, and by the obligation laid upon them 
to serve each other. Hence are we confident of his inexor- 
able and perfected justice, essential to entire welfare, in 
which justice every life shall eventually be complete ; also 
of his tender mercy to the erring, he having opened a way, 
through infinite self-sacrifice, whereby to be just and yet 
justify the penitent, and secure to him eternal welfare and 
blessedness. Our God is no egoist, but an altruist. He did 
not make us, nor does he rule us, for his own glory, but for 
our own beatitude. God is love. 



ELEMENTARY ETHICS 



SECOND PAET-OEGA]SriZATION 
TRANSITION 

§ 85. A glance over the course thus far pursued will 
prepare for further advance. The purpose of Ethics is to 
bring our ordinary moral judgments, so far as they tally with 
enlightened conscience, into a coherent system, discovering 
in them a principle which shall give it philosophic unity, 
and also furnish, if we would not have a mere castle in the 
air, a foundation on which to build. Beginning with the 
common notion of a right, its condition is at once seen to be 
a reciprocal relation between persons, each having orderly 
claims upon the other, which claims compose his rights. 
These rights are grounded in the very constitution of human 
nature, which, moved by its normal desires, seeks their grati- 
fication. The fundamental right is a right to liberty in this 
pursuit. This is the primary principle of Ethics. An inten- 
tional violation of a right, an interference in one's proper 
liberty, is a wrong, a trespass, which being a subversion of 
constituted order, is forbidden. This is the moral law, dis- 
cerned by conscience, and supported by subjective and objec- 
tive sanctions. 

Obligation takes several forms whose essence is one. Pri- 
marily its law forbids aggressive trespass, then equally it 
forbids retentive and neglective trespass. From these emerge 

121 



122 ORGANIZATION 

the comprehensive forms of justice, duty, virtue, service and 
love, the last pair being the choice expression simply because 
it brings more clearly forward the common essence. For, in 
examining the springs of action, the affections are seen to be 
naturally paramount, all other desires ancillary and disinter- 
ested. They are inconsistent with interested motives whose 
ends, lying within the agent himself, are selfishly opposed 
to loving service. The ideal man expends his energies in 
serving the interests of his fellows without thought of his 
own as separate and independent, but only as involved in 
the common welfare. 

It should be observed that there are three principal notions 
pervading the discussion, which grow out from the funda- 
mental notion of rights. These are: 

1st. Trespass, in its direct and indirect sense, which as 
forbidden expresses the whole of obligation. 

2d. Trust, in the active sense of mutual confidence that 
the law of trespass will be observed; and in the passive 
sense of stewardship, of being a trustee of all possessions, 
including life itself. 

3d. Defense, meaning the right and duty to guard trusts 
by resisting encroachment on them ; which is the only prem- 
ise that can warrant an interference in another's liberty. 

A strict and generous conformity to law results in common 
welfare. Welfare consists of liberty and continuous success 
in the exercise of benevolence and beneficence. The correl- 
ative criterion and natural consequence of welfare is happi- 
ness, which involves the special pleasure arising from a 
consciousness of disinterested conduct, and in general that 
arising from the satisfaction of enlarged and harmoniously 
regulated desires. But it is the essential dignity of benevo- 
lence rather than the resultant happiness that makes common 
welfare the proper aim and end of endeavor. 

Finally, the general constitution or nature of mankind is 



TRANSITION 123 

not the ultimate ground of obligation. A practical ethics 
may be built upon it, but complete theory needs to look 
beyond, into the nature of the Maker, which is the ultimate 
determinant of all nature, and more especially of the native 
obligation which binds his rational creatures to each other 
and to himself. 

§ 86. We are to pass now from the consideration of obli- 
gation, a binding together, to that of organization, a working 
together. Heretofore the simple reciprocal relation of man 
to man, with occasional anticipations of other relations, has 
been the basis of our explanation. This view has proved 
sufficient for the development of certain ethical principles, 
and their application to the case supposed. But human 
relations are mostly complex, consisting largely of relations 
of the individual man to societies, and of societies to their 
individual members, and also of societies to each other. In 
considering hereafter these complex relations, it will be 
found that the same principles without addition are applica- 
ble to solve the obligations involved. The right aim of 
society, in its various organic forms, is likewise the common 
welfare, to be sought under the impulse of love. Every 
moral agent is a member of some system in whose welfare 
his own is bound up, and thus sharing his own beneficence, 
he finds his welfare, not in opposition to or deprivation of 
others or in any self-seeking, but in union with his kind. 

The advantage of organized effort is familiar in the notion 
of help, the combination of several energies to accomplish a 
single purpose, one will directing many forces to the same 
end. The will may be that of one man, as a Caesar, a Loy- 
ola, a Richelieu, a Napoleon, a Bismarck, overmastering and 
bringing to unity the wills of a multitude ; or, turning from 
autocracy to democracy, the unity of many wills may be the 
result of a free consensus, as in a republic, and in voluntary 



124 ORGANIZATION 

associations of all kinds. In this oneness of will the divided 
becomes an individual, a Briareus. What is subjectively 
plural is objectively single. The individuality is complete 
in its solidarity, and the combination is to be judged as an 
undivided whole, whether it be a family, a mercantile firm, a 
society, an army, or a nation. 

Likewise let it be observed that conscience is catholic, and 
the law it reveals universal. Now a combination of men for 
a common purpose or purposes must be duly regulated by 
the common conscience. An organized association is respon- 
sible for its official actions. Even a nation may do right or 
wrong, and accordingly is honored or censured and perhaps 
punished. As a common will makes it an individual, so a 
common conscience makes it a person ; for as a body it is 
conscious of obligation, and thus is a person. This organic 
personality, though not wholly independent of, yet is to be 
distinguished from, the private and persistent personality of 
the members taken severally, for it implies a mass of super- 
added obligations dominating the whole. Thus an organism, 
or that wherein all parts and the whole are mutually means 
and end, is recognized, when it consists of men, as an indi- 
vidual personality, subject in all functional activity, both 
internal and external, to the moral law. 



THE MAN 125 



CHAPTER I 

THE MAX 

§ 87. It will be well, as introductory- to the subsequent 
matter and for the sake o£ its clear treatment, to examine 
here the organic character of the human constitution. 

Each individual man is a completely organized being. 
Primarily he consists of a body and a mind or spirit. He is 
essentially a duality. A human body without a mind is not 
a man ; it is merely a corpse. A mind without a body is — 
science knows not what. The disembodied human spirit 
may furnish matter for revelation, but since it presents no 
phenomena for our observation, it is beyond the reach of 
science. The man we study is a body and mind. These 
are coordinate. Both being essential, we cannot say which 
has priority in efficiency, any more than we can say which 
blade of a pair of shears does the more work. They cooper- 
ate, and neither can perform its functions apart from the 
other. Thus the body is for the mind, and the mind is for 
the body. Each is a means serving the other as an end, so 
that together they constitute a duplex organic whole. 

Evidently the body is itself an organism. The limbs are 
for the sustenance of the trunk, and the trunk is for the 
sustenance of the limbs. If the body suffer mutilation, the 
loss may in a measure be compensated by an increased or a 
specialized activity of other organs, yet it is a defect. The 
heart supplies the brain with blood, the brain supplies the 
heart with energy. Moreover, each subsidiary organ is itself 
an organism. The visual organ, the eye, serving as a guide 
to the movements of the whole, is composed of various 



126 OE GANIZA TION 

organs, as the cornea, the lens, the retinal screen, each of 
which is a means to every other as an end. Thus the whole 
body is an organism composed of many organisms, to each of 
which every other and the whole brings its contribution. 

§ 88. The mind is a complement of faculties, an assem- 
blage of functions. Its several generic powers, knowing and 
feeling, desiring and willing, are reciprocally related. Each 
class is a means to the others as ends, enabling them to fulfill 
their normal functions. Were there no intelligence, there 
could be no emotion or sentiment ; were there no intelligence 
and feeling, there could be no desire ; were there no desire, 
there could be no volition ; and were there no motived voli- 
tion, there could be no intelligence higher than mere brutal 
receptivity. Each serves the other and the whole. 

We must be on our guard lest we transfer to this spiritual 
sphere our notions of corporeal organs. These organs are 
distinct entities standing apart in space ; whereas the mental 
faculties and capacities are simply properties or functions of 
one and the same entity whose substance has no relation to 
space, except through the incorporating body. It is never- 
theless evident that these generic properties are mutually 
related as means and end. Hence they are organized as to 
their functions, and the mind, by virtue of this constitution, 
is a spiritual organism. 

Furthermore, the specific powers are organically related, 
each special faculty being supported in the exercise of its 
functions by each and all the rest of its class. It will be 
best to exemplify this by the desires, with which, as motives 
of the will, we are here particularly concerned. 

The desires are primarily divided into the craving desires, 
or appetites and appetencies, whose function impels to 
acquire, and the giving desires, or affections, whose func- 
tion impels to impart. This opposition is merely logical, 



TEE MAN 127 

for actually, in their naturally constituted order, they coop- 
erate, the former seeking to acquire in order that the latter 
may be prepared to impart. The suppression or hinderance 
of either would be a mutilation, worse than the amputation 
of a leg or arm. As already pointed out, the exercise of the 
craving desires in disregard of the affections, is abnormal, 
leading to a distraction of the affections from their proper 
objects, and to a subversion of their functions; also the 
exercise of the affections in disregard of the appetites and 
appetencies, is abnormal, leading to inefficiency from lack of 
resources supplying what affection would bestow; but, if 
both classes be exercised according to their constitutional 
relations, each with regard to the other, then the offices they 
are naturally fitted to fulfill are performed, their several and 
combined efficiency is attained, and their exercise is normal. 
Each is for the other. 

The same principle is applicable to all the various mental 
powers both in particular and in general, thus showing the 
mind as a whole to be an organism consisting of minor or 
subsidiary organisms so delicately adjusted that an excess or 
deficiency or distortion in the action of any one disorders 
every other and the whole. 

§ 89. Let us try for a moment to imagine what a man 
might be and become if he were somehow so separated from 
all objects of affection that it could have no play. We need 
not suppose him incapable of affection, but only that it be 
wholly dormant from lack of call. Allow that this solitary can 
provide the necessaries of life, and even many of its luxuries, 
and that he can successfully engage in self-culture. Pru- 
dently caring for his body, he is temperate, and enjoys phys- 
ical health and strength. Under the impulse of craving 
propensities, he acquires a wealth of means to further enjoy- 
ment, and his cultured intellect gathers and delights in treas- 
ures of knowledge. 



128 ORGANIZATION 

Now we point out that, in this imaginary case, there is 
strictly nothing moral or immoral; for, it is the relation 
to rational beings, including Deity, or at least to sentient 
beings, and not merely the possession of a rational nature, 
that determines the existence of rights and obligation. No 
trespass is possible, in case of an absolute solitary, for there 
are no rights or counter rights. No duty is done, for there 
is no one to whom a debt is due. There is no virtue or 
vice, for there is no law demanding conformity. There is 
no justice or injustice, for there is no claimant. Nor can 
there be loving service. Indeed, this isolated man is desti- 
tute of actual conscience, for no occasion would bring the 
potential to an actual discernment of moral law. He has no 
responsibility, is not a moral being, not human, not a man, 
unus homo, nullus homo, not a person, since he has no con- 
sciousness of obligation. With him nothing is either right 
or wrong ; even suicide would not be a crime. Truly it is 
not good that the man should be alone. Pleasures we allow 
he may have, even the intellectual; otherwise they are less 
than brutal, for the brute enjoys at least instinctive affec- 
tion. But the solitary can never be happy, certainly not 
with that happiness which ripens into blessedness. 

It appears, then, that man is essentially a moral being, 
and therefore essentially a social being. So let us change 
our supposition from one solitary to one in society, whose 
affections, however, are wholly dormant because of his entire 
selfishness. Guided by the counsels of prudence, negatively 
in avoiding harm, positively in securing personal benefit, he 
may accomplish the correct functioning of his physical or- 
gans, and maintain his body in wholesome condition. Also 
he may wisely discipline his intellectual powers, and regulate 
his passions and emotions, and so attain a high grade of effi- 
ciency. Moreover, by observing certain rules of art, using 
his fellows as means to secure his own ends, he may accu- 



THE MAN 129 

mulate wealth, power, and fame. Such seem to have been the 
character and aims of the more refined peoples of antiquity, 
especially of the Greeks. Their self-culture, looking solely 
to the beautiful development of the individual man, was 
very sensitive to the aesthetic elements essential to excel- 
lence, while the ethical elements were more lightly esteemed 
and often disregarded. The tendency was strongly egoistic, 
seeking the enjoyment of a fair personality, and its secure 
tenure against infringement. And in modern times such 
self-culture is widely and highly approved, many moralists 
making it the basis of their systems. 

The supposition of a cultured man in society without nat- 
ural affection is monstrous. Unlike the solitary, he is a 
morally responsible person, for conscience in him is actual, 
the law is upon him, and in his disregard of all save his own 
interests, he is a law-breaker, thoroughly immoral. Yet, 
strange to say, he may be a good neighbor and citizen ; for, 
if one selfishly serve his own interest with far-sighted pru- 
dence and wide-reaching wisdom, this works out for society 
very much the same result as if his energies were wholly 
devoted to thoroughly unselfish, disinterested, loving ser- 
vice. Such is the economical ordering of human affairs. 
But it does not so work for the man himself. Though far 
from criminal or even disorderly, though he do not sin with 
his lips, and though he practice, for his own ends, a large 
beneficence, yet, without benevolence, he is a whited sepul- 
cher, a hypocrite, a moral monster. More likely, however, 
the inward corruption breaks forth, poisoning the air and 
multiplying ills. This has usually been the historical result. 
These considerations illustrate the fact that men are social 
beings in the sense of interdependence, not merely for the 
common needs of pleasurable living, but also for moral devel- 
opment by the exercise of mutual affection, through which 
alone the dignity of complete manhood is attainable. 



130 ORGANIZATION 

§ 90. But in real human life there is not and cannot be 
thorough seclusion. A solitary is a mere negation, a meta- 
physical abstraction, a logical ghost. We find ourselves in 
a world of fellow beings from whom it is impossible to be 
completely absolved. Even a Selkirk on his desert isle not 
only remembers his former associations, but contemplates 
the possibility of a return to the world, and hence is bound 
to comport himself with reference to it, to care for and culti- 
vate his powers as far as may be in view of that possibility. 
But should he reasonably despair of a return among men, 
still he may not neglect his personal dignity, or ever, even 
under the greatest suffering, take his own life ; for he can- 
not know his future here, and one relation, the chiefest of 
all, persists. He is bound by indissoluble obligations to his 
maker, law-giver and judge, whose claims are never released, 
and whose honor is involved. 

Also let it be remarked that the individual owes his exis- 
tence, as well as the possibility of its continuance and of all 
moral culture, so much to the human society in which he is 
ordinarily included, that it is rare to find one so totally de- 
praved as to be entirely destitute of all natural affection. 
A mother gives birth to her child; therein and thereafter 
the moral tie binds. No distance of place or time can atten- 
uate it to nothingness, no violence can sever it, even death 
spares a bond in dutiful memories rendered more precious 
and sacred by loss. Can a woman forget her sucking child, 
that she should not have compassion on the son of her 
womb ? Hardly is it possible. Can a son forget the mother 
who bore him, that he should not have compassion for her 
pains, her nurture, her watchings, her tender caresses? 
Hardly, yet perhaps less rare. Shall he not, even in mature 
years, honor his father and mother with kindly watch-care 
and grateful memories? Surely, even amid a godless civ- 
ilization, or even amid a barbarous heathenism, Nature 



THE MAN 131 

will enforce in some measure her claims for loving ser- 



vice. 



§ 91. If we view each man, then, as an organism of orga- 
nized organs, these standing to each other and to the whole 
in a relation of interdependence, and if we observe that he 
has the power of self-direction and control, it is clear that it 
is within him to conserve and cultivate his natural powers 
by regulating their organic relations, and that the bringing 
of all the corporeal and spiritual powers with which he is 
endowed by nature into full activity and harmonious coop- 
eration, is the discharge of obligation and the perfection of 
manhood. But also it is clear that the constitution of the 
man, apart from his affections, furnishes no ethical element, 
no basis for an ethical system. His subsidiary powers of 
body and mind are not persons, and there is no moral ele- 
ment that does not involve a personal relation. 

Such relation is necessarily implied in the existence and 
exercise of affection. There must be a sentient object, one 
capable of benefit, to whom there is conscious obligation. 
Herein, and herein only, personality appears ; herein, and 
herein only, moral character has its root and growth. The 
affections being psychologically and ethically essential to 
integral manhood, it follows that a man cannot be truly 
and rightly a man apart from his fellows, and in his 
relations to them his conscience discerns the moral law de- 
manding the exercise of righteous affections, and claiming 
recognition as the supreme law of humanity. 

There is no need to consider further the individual man. 
We have noted him as a typical organism, pointing out that, 
apart from his relations to others, that is, in him alone, there 
is no ethical element. In the prior part of this treatise the 
reciprocal relations of man to man, in their ethical aspect, 
have been discussed at length. True the mere coexistence 



132 ORGANIZATION 

of two persons may correctly be construed as an organism, 
each being for the other and both for the pair; especially 
exemplified by partners in business, they being formally uni- 
fied. But to view the simple relation of man to man as an 
organism would lead to no conclusions other than those 
already attained, and hence we may now dismiss this simple 
case also, and proceed to consider more intricate relations. 



TEE FAMILY 133 



CHAPTER II 

THE FAMILY 

§ 92. A study of the simple relation of man to man has 
enabled us to discover the principles of obligation, with their 
application in equivalent intercourse. This exposition, how- 
ever, though fundamental and widely comprehensive, is not 
exhaustive, and not adequate to the demands of right living. 
For, in actual life, the relations subsisting among men exhibit 
many varieties in kind, and those of the same kind many 
differences in degree; also these relations are subject to 
many and extreme changes, often amounting to reversal, due 
to growth, activity, and the ceaseless mutations of inter- 
course. Now, since all obligations originate in and corre- 
spond to present relations, it follows that the special duty of. 
a man to some one on his right hand is rarely quite similar 
to what is due to some one on his left ; also that his duty to 
either is often quite unlike the duty of that other to him ; 
and further, that his duty to any one to-day frequently 
differs greatly from what is due to the same one to-morrow. 
It is needful, therefore, to consider the kinds of relations in 
which men stand to each other, and their variations, in order 
to determine the corresponding obligations. 

The relations that obtain among men exhibit many varie- 
ties chiefly because of differences in social organization ; 
under which general title, therefore, human relations and 
consequent obligations may be distributed and discussed. 
The procedure involves the principle that the perfection of 
natural order, its harmony and stability, require that each 
member fulfill its office in the several organisms to which it 



134 ORGANIZATION 

belongs. This is a natural principle, physical and psychical 
and ethical, being applicable to the universe considered as 
an organic whole, as well as to each of its organized mem- 
bers, and specially, as we have just seen, to the microcosm, 
man. In society at large each one is morally bound to fulfill 
his functions as a member of the whole, and also as a mem- 
ber of each of those subordinate and constitutive organisms 
in which he is integrant. A study, then, of the chief con- 
stituents of society will bring into view the various kinds 
and degrees of duty corresponding to these functional rela- 
tions, whose variations determine the variations of personal 
obligation under the sole but universal law of loving service. 
To this study we now proceed. 

§ 93. Nature presents in both animals and plants a fun- 
damental fact in sex. This is a primary, inerasable distinc- 
tion that cuts all higher forms of animated beings, and 
especially the total of humanity together with every subordi- 
nate class of mankind, into two portions, delicately marked 
by anatomical and physiological variations which extend 
throughout the body, being discoverable even in the brain. 
The physical differences are normally attended by mental and 
moral differences which though less definite are not less deep, 
permanent and universal. In these differences originate an 
appetite and an affection which often become passionate, 
tending on the one hand toward the deepest degradation, and 
on the other to the highest exaltation. Hence it comes that 
the relation of the sexes is perhaps the most powerful social 
factor in every community, both savage and civilized. 

Herein the pointing of nature is distinctly to marriage and 
offspring. It sets apart a pair, a male and female, for each 
other, their exclusive union being spontaneously guarded by 
hygienic barriers, and by a prompt jealousy, fierce and fatal. 
Offspring brings into play strong parental instincts, prompt 






THE FAMILY 135 

ing protection, provision and nurture until maturity. Thus 
the family is preeminently a natural institution, which in 
some important respects takes precedence of all others, and 
is fundamental in the constitution of society. 

§ 94. The ideal family in modern society consists of a 
mature man and woman, not differing greatly in age, who of 
their own free will, have entered with civil and ecclesiastical 
forms, into the marriage bond, are living together as husband 
and wife, and providing for their yet unemancipated chil- 
dren. Their children are first a son, then a daughter, again 
a son, then another daughter. The parents, beside each 
other, have both a son and a daughter, and each child has 
both a brother and a sister. These exhaust the family rela- 
tions. To complete this ideal, add a home, giving common 
shelter, furnishing conveniences, and serving as a local habi- 
tation and center of union. 

What support this ideal receives from ethical principles 
will be more clearly seen after a detailed consideration of 
the several relations involved. But we make at once the 
obvious remark that it is not often fully realized, because of 
failure or irregularity in births, intervention of death, or ex- 
treme poverty. Still, even in such incomplete families, the 
relations are generally sufficient for the unfolding of the 
domestic virtues, the building of character, and the enjoy- 
ment of home life. 

§ 95. It is evident that a family is an organic union of 
several persons, as indicated in their common surname, and 
in the correlative terms husband and wife, parent and child, 
father or mother and son or daughter, brother and sister; 
each of these implying the existence of the other. Ethically 
each member is related to every other, and to the whole, as 
at once means and end. The existence of relations among 



136 ORGANIZATION 

these persons determines that there be corresponding obliga- 
tions, and the variety of relations determines a variety in 
the obligations. The particular kind and degree of the obli- 
gation of each member, is determined by the special function 
belonging to that member in maintaining the orderly unity 
of the organism. Just this much is the duty of each, and 
no more. 

If, however, there be, as there often is, disorder, distrac- 
tion or failure on the part of some one member, requiring addi- 
tional and special efforts on the part of the others to restore 
and maintain order and efficiency, then their duty is enlarged 
to meet the requisition. An excellent analogy is seen in the 
physical organism of the individual man. Each of the organs 
of his body contributes to the healthful action of every other, 
and all the others contribute to sustain each one. Moreover, 
when any one is disordered, there is a disturbance more or 
less general, a sympathetic suffering of all allied organs, and 
a feverish effort of nature to restore the normal condition. 

§ 96. In the actual case of a man and a woman obeying 
the beck of nature, and entering into the marriage relation, 
let the distinct personality of each, and their entire moral 
equivalence, be granted ; then several important truths are 
logically consequent. 

First. In consenting to this union, both parties are to 
exercise their unbiased free will. Any unwarranted inter- 
ference, objective or subjective, in the liberty of either is a 
trespass the more grievous because of its far reaching conse- 
quences. It is true that circumstances often warrant or even 
require a hindering interference, extending perhaps to pro- 
hibition, on the part of parents especially, or of friends, or of 
the State ; but it is obvious that, in a matter so extremely 
delicate, and of such vast importance to those immediately 
concerned, the warrant should be very clear. Compulsory 



THE FAMILY 137 

marriage, on the other hand, is never warrantable, and is one 
of the grossest forms of trespass. 

Secondly. Actual marriage, or the yielding of each to the 
other of what is peculiar to the distinct personality, works no 
detriment to the honor of either party, provided it be accom- 
panied by an entirely voluntary, mutual and unreserved sur- 
render of all the interests of life into the common keeping 
of both. Thereby the pair, without losing the distinct 
personality, become a single individual personality. In this 
fusion, their honor, social standing, property and prospects 
are rightly held in common by each for the other, by each 
for both, by both for each. The two are one. Their joint 
welfare and happiness is an inseparable compound. 

Thirdly. In the pair thus unified there should be but one 
will. A constant endeavor to harmonize opinions, senti- 
ments and desires, wherein a firm adherence to principle is 
combined with a yielding even in matters of importance, 
results in a singleness of will that is essential to the perfec- 
tion of the union. A tie so sacred should never be loosened 
by willful discord. Custom has established on firm and suf- 
ficient grounds that, generally speaking, the control in detail 
of interests outside the home shall be in the hand of the hus- 
band, and those within the home shall be subject to the man- 
agement of the wife. But, while the decisions of each 
should be as far as possible in accord with the views and 
wishes of the other, yet, in case of a permanent differ- 
ence, the final decision should be left to the one in whose 
province the matter in question belongs. 

Fourthly. The union may not be enlarged by the addi- 
tion of another partner. Polyandry or polygamy, common 
among brutes, is inadmissible among persons, it being incon- 
sistent with the moral equivalence of the sexes. If more 
than one of either sex be bound to one of the other, the plu- 
rality is severally deprived of the rank of equal fellowship, 
and degraded to a thing useful merely as a means. 



138 OBGANIZA TION 

Fifthly. While it may be doubted whether there be physi- 
ological reasons why the marriage of persons of near consan- 
guinity should not be permitted, the ethical reasons are 
clearly good and sufficient. The marriage of members of 
the same family would bring about such an admixture of 
moral relations as to confuse the functions of its members, 
rendering them perplexing and distracting, and so disorder- 
ing the harmony of its system. Hence the State, in the 
interest of the family, and of general society whose moral 
health is involved with that of the family, prohibits such 
marriage as incestuous, tending to disturb the normal opera- 
tion of the family organism, and to check the unfolding of 
its peculiar beauty and worth. 

§ 97. Marriage is indissoluble, except by death or crime. 
If death sever the bonds, a new marriage of the survivor 
cannot be prohibited by the State, for civil law is properly 
concerned with temporal relations only, and so the question 
of second marriage must be left to the religious convictions 
of the parties. A formal dissolution of marriage is justified 
specially by the crime of conjugal infidelity, this being a vio- 
lation of its peculiar significance and manifest purpose, and 
itself an actual breaking of the vow. 

Legal questions concerning divorce, with permit of new 
marriage, present many difficulties, especially on plea of 
cruelty or desertion. But it is clear that a wished-for disso- 
lution cannot rightly be decreed merely because of disease, 
poverty, misfortune, disappointed expectation, "incompati- 
bility," whatever this may mean, or the dissatisfaction of one 
or both parties, or even because of wickedness and crime 
that does not victimize home. None of these can be allowed 
as sufficient ground for entire divorce, if society would pre- 
serve its moral health, so largely dependent on the sanctity 
of marriage. Relief may be had in extreme cases by a legal 



THE FAMILY 139 

recognition of actual separation, without a severance of the 
moral bond that forbids a new relation. 

§ 98. Persons of full age, and emancipated from parental 
authority, often do not marry for some years, or perhaps 
never marry. The social status of such persons is more or 
less abnormal according as they are more or less absolved 
from family connection. For the family is the basis of social 
organization, and since these are now but external appen- 
dages to some one, they cannot be accounted more than 
fractional members of society at large. 

Such persons are unhappily at great disadvantage in respect 
of moral culture. For the conditions of complete develop- 
ment are lacking to those destitute of the familiar objects 
around which the strongest and best affections of the human 
soul gather and grow, and whose lack it is not possible fully 
to compensate by other lines of moral activity. In these 
other lines, however, exceptional attainments are often made, 
commanding high respect, and rounding out a useful life. 

§ 99. When the family circle is completed by the birth 
of children, a new and wide field is opened for the cultiva- 
tion of ethical graces. Moral possibilities, which otherwise 
are forever latent, become patent. The potential becomes 
actual, and nature has not planted in vain. No man is ever 
wholly a man until he is a husband and a father ; and, more 
emphatically, no woman is wholly a woman until she is a 
wife and mother. A babe is a pledge of love, an additional 
and powerful tie, a sacred trust, calling out and taxing the 
moral energies, and making an unlimited demand on loving 
service. All that is beautiful in human nature blooms under 
the influence of this fertilizing relation. It is easy to adore 
the Madonna. 

The familiar care and provident rearing of children con- 



140 OR GANIZA TION 

stantly exercises the domestic virtues, tending directly to the 
perfection of manhood and womanhood. The responsibility 
and difficulty are of the gravest. The culture should be 
dominated by the view that, in the order of nature, the child 
is destined to moral independence, and to membership in 
society. In being prepared for this, it has many and very 
sacred rights. Its parents are bound, as their function in 
the family organism, to provide for its healthful maintenance 
suitable to their rank in society, for its education, intellec- 
tual, moral and religious, and, in general, for its present and 
prospective welfare. Great laxity of restraint is likely to be 
ruinous; but, on the other hand, severe restrictions, a rigid 
molding of character, opinions, and religious creed, is hardly 
less to be deprecated as an injurious trespass on the right of 
the child to generous culture, and the free growth of its 
individuality. 

The office of brothers and sisters in this organic relation 
is affectionate sympathy, and mutual helpfulness, which 
should extend throughout life. As sons and daughters they 
are bound to honor father and mother by a willing and 
pleased obedience to their rightful authority, and by a 
prompt readiness to promote their welfare. Also they are 
bound to guard sedulously the honor of the family name, 
and to seek actively the advancement of the common interest. 

§ 100. This human institution, the family, is preeminently 
natural, being physically determined. Those born into it 
are involuntarily and inseparably its members. By its pri- 
macy it stands as the unit of society and of the State, with- 
out derogation from the distinct personality, moral status 
and obligation of its individual members. Yet it is a whole. 
Even when some part or parts are lacking, it is still a unit. 
It is not a logical whole, a genus, for its parts are not 
species or kinds of family. It is an integral whole ; not col- 



THE FAMILY 141 

lective, as a cluster of grapes, but organic, as a flower whose 
central organs, stamen and pistil, yield germ and seed, within 
a corolla. It is an individual, indivisible in itself, and sepa- 
rate from every other. 

Less clear perhaps, but not less true, is it that a family is 
a single personality. The definition of a person is a being 
conscious of obligation. Now there is a consciousness com- 
mon to all members of a family, an intelligent apprehension 
of moral law which is the same in each, a judgment which, 
under the influence of common interest, is assimilated into 
one, a pervading sentiment, a united impulse to effectuate a 
single will. The obligation of some one family as an organic 
whole to some one man as its benefactor, or to some other 
family, or to general society, is matter of familiar speech and 
acknowledgment, and the common consciousness of such 
obligation constitutes its unique personality, quite distin- 
guishable from the peculiar personality of its several mem- 
bers. To this conception of its distinct personality may be 
added the possession of family traits in features, manners, 
customs, habits, and in general, of character, often sharply 
marked. Moreover, what wounds one member, wounds all ; 
the honor, dignity and welfare of the whole, is in common 
keeping. 

§ 101. The individual personality of a family as an organ- 
ized unit, distinct from the personality of its members, is 
manifest in the significant fact that it claims a life beyond 
the present generation. Its ancestry extending back for 
ages is its pride, and its posterity in an indefinite future is 
its hope. What it has been confers titles of honor, and what 
it may become excites anxious solicitude. The death of a 
member breaks in upon its present entirety, but does not 
interrupt its continuity. Only by sterility and death com- 
bined is it extinguished, and this is accounted a special loss 
to society, a public and private misfortune. 



142 ORGANIZATION 

A family of the present generation, inheriting the honor 
and wealth of the same family in preceding generations, rec- 
ognizes its moral obligation to maintain and rightly use the 
trust, thus discharging a sacred debt due the dead. Also it 
recognizes its moral obligation to the coming generation in 
provision for its welfare, thus discharging a sacred debt due 
descendants, including those yet unborn. That one is thus 
bound to pay debts due the deceased and the unborn, is not 
fanciful sentiment, nor figurative speech, but real, literal 
ethics. Current expressions and approved literature recog- 
nize in many ways the obligation as especially incumbent on 
the family, whose individuality and personality extend 
through generations that come and go, yet perpetuate its 
organic unity. 

§ 102. The foregoing considerations enable us to under- 
stand more clearly the ethical principles that regulate the 
holding and disposing of property. 

Property owned by either party at time of marriage, and 
that acquired afterward, is, by virtue of the marriage, the 
common property of the family. That either husband or 
wife should have property at disposal apart from and inde- 
pendently of the other, though often it is so arranged, con- 
tradicts the unity of the relation, drawing a line of separation 
and making a distinction that ought never to exist. Such 
an arrangement is inconsistent with that entire surrender of 
all the interests of life into the common keeping which the 
marriage bond requires; and in so far the marriage is but 
partial. The reserve implies a distrust that is chilling, and 
likely to produce a discord that is fatal. It is a withholding 
trespass. 

Evidently, then, the family property should not be largely 
ventured in trade, or otherwise disposed of, without the free 
consent of all members, including the children, in whom also 



THE FAMILY 143 

property rights are vested by birth, when they become suffi- 
ciently mature to appreciate and rightly judge the interests 
involved. Yet, be it remembered, that each and all should 
seek, by a reasonable yielding, to assimilate their views and 
wishes, thereby attaining a unity of will which thus becomes 
the will of the family. 

Also it is evident that the management of the family prop- 
erty in detail must be left to some one member. This seems 
naturally to devolve upon the husband and father who, 
according to the usual and approved order, takes charge of 
the family interests outside of home, and hence is best 
acquainted with public affairs. Because property is held 
and ordinary business transacted in his name, he is apt to 
regard himself as exclusive and irresponsible owner. This 
error, pervading society, stands greatly in need of correction. 

§ 103. Distribution by testament of the property of a 
family is, for like reasons, by the hand and in the name of 
its ostensible head ; also for the reason that, preparatory to 
his decease, when the house band is loosed, and the family 
disintegrated, there is need of a special and provisory adjust- 
ment of property rights by the one to whom their care has 
been chiefly committed. In any such adjustment the united 
consensus of all members should be had, so that together 
with the avoidance of any actual trespass, complaint of wrong 
may also be forestalled. 

Testamentary distribution gives rise to many difficult 
questions which largely occupy the courts. The funda- 
mental principles involved are, however, sufficiently clear. 
A producer has a right to use and dispose of his products at 
will, and this will must be effective beyond his decease, else 
a great incentive to industry and accumulation would be lost, 
projects for the benefit of the coming generation would not 
be devised and driven, and social progress would be hindered, 



144 OB GANIZA TION 

inasmuch as each generation would have to make a new be- 
ginning. But let it be observed that the home management 
and industry, its provision for rest and refreshment, its cheer- 
ing influence, its trifling comforts even, are very important 
elements in the efficiency of the producer, and thereby enter 
into his product ; so that all members of the home circle, but 
especially the husband and wife, are partners in business, 
and since they share in the producing, are entitled to share 
in the production, both in consuming and in disbursing. 
Beside this, it should be distinctly recognized that all posses- 
sions are held and managed as trusts, and their agreed testa- 
mentary distribution should be regulated accordingly. The 
testator is bound to provide suitably for the family, thus dis- 
charging his primary obligation as its trustee. A surplus 
may rightly become matter of bequest to collaterals, to friends, 
or to the general public, in the founding or endowing hospi- 
tals, schools, libraries, and such like benefactions, according 
to the best judgment of the trustee representing the family in 
this discharge of its alien obligations. 



THE COMMUNITY 145 



CHAPTER III 

THE COMMUNITY 

§ 104. Human beings manifest a strong disposition to 
gather into groups more or less permanent. In some of these 
population is massed, as in cities ; in others it is more sparse, 
as in villages, hamlets, neighborhoods. Hence in any inhab- 
ited region, it is easy to point out centers of population, 
though the circumference be quite indefinite. Besides the 
gregarious instinct of the human animal, there are many 
rational determinants of this tendency, both economical and 
ethical. Every one owes his existence to progenitors and 
also is indebted for its continuance, for all physical means, 
conveniences and comforts of living, for all intellectual and 
moral culture, so entirely to association, more or less intimate, 
with his fellows, that all the interests of life, his whole wel- 
fare, is bound up with them. Strict independence is a prac- 
tical impossibility. 

A group of people thus specially related by living in prox- 
imity is a community. This is not merely a collection but a 
body of people ; for the necessities of its members which draw 
them together determine at once an organic constitution. 
Each member contributes more or less directly to the welfare 
of every other, and to the welfare of the whole, in which 
welfare he participates. The variations of function are deter- 
mined by the pressure of various needs, and by the fitness of 
various abilities to meet them. There is a tacit consensus in 
the distribution of these functions; but since there is no 
formal and definite enactment of a constitution, the com- 
munity is often spoken of as unorganized society ; whereas, 



146 ORGANIZATION 

though not formally, yet it is essentially an organism, neces- 
sitated by the interdependence of its members. 

§ 105. Recur to the primary ethical principle that every 
one has a right to gratify his normal desires, and to this, be- 
side, that it is his obligation not merely passively to allow 
their impulse, but actively to seek their gratification, and it 
is manifest that the fulfillment of obligation is impracticable 
apart from society. For, no class of normal desires can 
properly be gratified without reference to associates; but 
especially the affections, which are conditioned on the presen- 
tation of sentient objects, can have no exercise in solitary life. 
In such life the chiefest, indeed the sole function of humanity 
is perverted and comes to naught. Mankind is a brother- 
hood, and it is only by close fraternization, only by being a 
man among men, that it is possible to be wholly a man. 
Whoever lives his life in its natural and rightful fullness is a 
constant recipient from his fellows of the necessary means, 
for which he is dependent on them, and therefore is constantly 
incurring an indebtedness which requires a constant reciprocal 
activity to repay. 

These considerations forbid an ascetic life, which, under 
the guise of righteous self-denial, renounces invigorating en- 
joyment, and thus leads to such an impoverishment of spirit- 
ual power that its dues go unpaid. Nor can the life of a 
recluse be approved, which seeks self-sufficiency in solitude 
and retired contemplation, or an escape from thronging ills 
by a timid retreat into privacy, idle ease, and indifference to 
the common welfare. Likewise we must condemn the life 
of a reserved student who, enamored of truth, withdraws 
from familiar intercourse, and in the scholarly seclusion of 
his library seeks to accumulate knowledge with no intent or 
thought of sharing it, and thereby promoting the well-being 
even of his compeers. These several forms of social seques- 



THE COMMUNITY 147 

tration can be approved only when they are temporary, and 
for the purpose of recuperation and preparation for better 
service in subsequent life. Thus only can they be acquitted 
of selfishness, and accepted as transient phases of that active 
life of practical benevolence which alone develops the moral 
dignity of true manhood. 

§ 106. The reciprocal obligations of the members of a com- 
munity are recognized in a code of social intercourse, an 
unwritten common law, which prevails throughout and regu- 
lates communication. This law, like the unwritten Common 
Law of the courts, is a detail of rights and duties. Both sys- 
tems originated in the exigencies of popular intercourse, and 
by degrees have been fully developed ; and both are but va- 
riations, explications and applications of the law of trespass. 

The conventions of society are known as the rules of good 
breeding and good manners. They require comity, a proper 
consideration and respect for the minor rights of each other, 
a delicate regard for one another's wishes, feelings and pe- 
culiarities, a prompt attention to wants, their serviceable 
anticipation, a complaisant readiness in assistance; this is 
politeness. In the denser portions of a community there 
is constant call for its exercise, so that people, even those of 
otherwise indifferent culture, become by attrition polished, 
that is, polite ; they are civil, and the higher ranks are cour- 
teous or courtly in address. To this must be added the spe- 
cial code of social etiquette observed in refined circles, which 
descends to minutiae, and is so rigid in its required decorum 
that an infraction of it is sometimes less readily condoned 
than vice. All such conventionalities arise from the union 
or consolidation of interests and responsibilities, and betoken 
the solidarity of the community. 

§ 107. A prime condition of the wholesomeness of a com- 
munity is the truthfulness of its members. The obligation 



148 ORGANIZATION 

to be truthful in both word and deed is clear. Every one 
has a right to certain services from his fellow man, and a 
usually just and sometimes very important claim is for an 
opinion, judgment, information, direction, advice, sympathy. 
If these be reserved when due, it is a trespass, a restriction 
of a rightful liberty to use and profit by them. Still greater 
is the trespass, if they be misstated, thereby misinforming 
and misleading the recipient, for then his trust is violated, 
his confidence outraged. If the claim be allowed, the expres- 
sion by word or deed must be true to the thought. 

But the claim is not always just, not always to be allowed. 
We are not always bound to speak; often it is right and 
wise to be silent. Nor, if we speak, are we always bound to 
tell the whole truth ; in which case the extent of the reserve 
is matter for conscientious judgment, having care not to mis- 
lead by the partial statement. This right of private reserve 
is superseded by the courts in the interest of society, and the 
witness required to tell the whole truth without reserve. 

Whether deceit in any form is ever justifiable is a ques- 
tion that has been discussed for centuries, and is still unset- 
tled. On the one hand it is affirmed that deceit is in its 
very nature irreconcilable with the eternal principles of right 
and justice ; and on the other hand it is asserted that certain 
emergencies may justify a departure from ordinary rules of 
conduct, and render deceit not only justifiable bat obligatory. 
This question of the ages is not to be answered in a few 
words. We must be content here with saying : first, that a 
lie is never justifiable ; secondly, that not every deception is 
to be accounted a lie, e.g., the myth of Santa Claus ; and 
thirdly, if the definition of a deception be allowed wider 
scope than the definition of a lie, yet is a deception so rarely 
right and duty that every one should practice habitual truth- 
fulness, deviating from it with great hesitation, and only 
when the justification is beyond all question. 



THE COMMUNITY 149 

§ 108. The general obligation to be truthful takes a num- 
ber of specific forms. Beside this duty in the commonplace 
talking of familiar intercourse, we place the formal tie of a 
promise, written, oral, or indirectly implied in mere behavior. 
The obligation in such case is strengthened by the fact that 
the promisee, in reliance on the faithfulness of the promiser, 
may in his life conduct order important matters with refer- 
ence to the promise, and suffer injury or even disaster should 
it fail. A promise given under an essential misunderstand- 
ing, or, since we cannot accurately forecast the future, in 
case the duty of its observance is superseded by some higher 
unforeseen duty with which it is radically inconsistent, is 
null. This does not endorse the loose aphorism that a bad 
promise is better broken than kept ; for, if its badness work 
merely the private personal injury of the promiser, unless 
ruinous in an intolerable extreme, he is not thereby dis- 
charged of the obligation. We commend him that sweareth 
to his own hurt, and changeth not. A promise made under 
compulsion cannot be claimed by the promisee, yet it meas- 
urably binds the promiser because of respect for his word. 
In no case, however, is a promise obligatory if the fulfillment 
be criminal, for it can never be duty to commit crime. 

A contract or covenant differs from a simple promise in 
that it implies an exchange of services, and reciprocal obliga- 
tion. It is usually under the protection of special statute, 
an outcome of the moral element, of that mutual trust which 
is the basis of social order. Contracts are of endless variety, 
and affect nearly every detail of private and public life ; and 
if their binding character were not fully recognized there 
would be no security in affairs. A deception practiced by 
either party in making a contract invalidates it ; but both 
parties must abide the consequences of carelessness, thought- 
lessness, or stupidity. 

Common honesty in trade, and in business dealings gener- 



150 ORGANIZATION 

ally, is another form of truthfulness. Exchange of services, 
of goods, and of other forms of property, has the advantage 
of being estimated numerically in the medium of exchange, 
money, which gives exactness to the mutual obligation, and 
sharply expresses its violation. The interests involved in 
such transactions are so widely interlaced that fraud excites 
general indignation and reprobation. There is hardly any 
form of trespass that incurs such deep and lasting disgrace 
as dishonesty. 

§ 109. The membership of an organized community does 
not consist in merely so many men, women and children, 
standing singly as discrete elements coalescing into a con- 
crete body. A strong tendency to such individualism has 
marked the nineteenth century, in France, in England, and 
even more positively in the United States. It cries out for 
liberty, equality, fraternity, and demands that creed, race, and 
even sex shall be ignored on the forum, at the polls, and in 
the schools. Now, while each individual man and woman is 
a distinguishable member of society, it should be observed, 
in opposition to individualism, that each is primarily a mem- 
ber of a family whereby he or she is socialized, that the 
family is properly the organized and organizing unit of so- 
ciety, and that a community consists fundamentally of asso- 
ciated families. This incidentally appears in the fact that 
the social standing of the individual is in general determined 
by that of his family, above which it is difficult to rise, and 
below which one rarely falls. The question, What is he? 
asks after his vocation ; but, Who is he ? asks after his 
family. 

A variety of minor organizations are usually formed by 
voluntary association, which also are integrant members ; as, 
social or literary clubs, and benevolent societies. Beside 
these are business firms of two or more members, stock com- 



THE COMMUNITY 151 

panies, cooperative associations, and guilds or trade-unions. 
Such combinations for more effective achievement are often 
legally incorporated, and usually have a contract or articles 
of agreement, or a written organic law or constitution, stating 
the ends they seek and the means, and defining the functions 
of members and officers as duties; the variations in duty 
arising from a specializing of functions so as to constitute 
an efficient cooperative whole. A special class of subordi- 
nate organisms is seen in the schools, which also usually 
have a formal constitution and laws defining the duties of 
members, official and unofficial. They are instituted specially 
to meet the debt due the next generation, are essential to the 
perpetuity rather than to the maintenance of society, and 
form a bond, a historical enchainment, between its present 
and its future. 

Each of the foregoing minor organizations is itself a mem- 
ber of the community, having, as already said of the family, 
an individual personality distinguishable from the individual 
personality of its components. Moreover, although the 
bounds of any single community be ill defined, still commu- 
nities are recognized as more or less distinct from one 
another. Now each of these as an organic whole has not 
only obligations to its various members, but also to neighbor- 
ing communities with which it is in communication. Thus 
the community as a whole is an individual, a personality, 
with a conscience, and a moral judgment in the consensus of 
its members, which passes upon its own character and con- 
duct, upon that of its several members, and upon that of 
affiliated communities. 

§ 110. The organic nature of a community distributing 
various functions or offices and consequent duties among its 
members, is clearly seen in its division of labor. The neces- 
sities of life necessitate labor, but no one by his own labor 



152 OB GANIZA TION 

alone can surely supply even these, much less can he produce 
the many requisites to comfortable living. The civilized man 
has many desires or wants that have become so habitual as to 
be classed as necessaries. For the full gratification of these 
he is dependent on the productive labor of his fellows. 
Hence the pressure of such wants molds the community 
into an organism, in which each works for every other, and 
they for him ; also he labors for the welfare of the whole, and 
the end of the whole is the welfare of each. Thus a simple 
community will comprise a shoemaker, a tailor, a carpenter, 
a blacksmith, a shopkeeper, a printer, a doctor, a lawyer, a 
schoolmaster, and a curate. These exchange services or 
products, and a variety of duties is a consequence of the 
organization. 

A discussion of division of labor is not proper to a treatise 
on Ethics, but belongs rather to the theory of Economics. 
It is appropriate, however, to observe that, in addition to its 
economical advantage, it has the moral advantage of giving 
rise to the common virtues of honesty, industry, and respect 
for order, and to a sense of personal responsibility, the re- 
sponsibility of each worker to his fellows and to the commu- 
nity at large. Besides, it originates the conception of a 
vocation, a calling, and establishes each worker in a position, 
changed from a mere man into a member, whereby he is no 
longer just like all others, but assumes a place and mark 
specially his own. Extreme division of labor, however, de- 
presses the intellectual status of the laborer, narrows his 
spiritual horizon, and assimilates his activity to that of an 
automatic mechanism. 

The distribution of functions brings about social classifica- 
tion. Mere laborers are distinguished from farmers and 
mechanics, and these from skilled artisans, and these again 
from artists and the professional class whose work is mostly 
intellectual. Greater honor always attaches to the finer, and 



THE COMMUNITY 153 

less to the coarser kinds of labor. This has the wholesome 
effect of inducing effort to rise into what is accounted a 
higher social rank, and is thus a powerful stimulus to civil- 
ization. But here also an abatement must be made. Classes 
strongly marked tend to become castes, in which form their 
wholesome effect disappears, ambitious effort is paralyzed, 
improvement discouraged, and civilization restrained. 

§ 111. In a prosperous community, one whose wealth in 
general is increasing, capital or the wealth destined to repro- 
ductive consumption tends to accumulate in the hands of 
those more intelligently industrious, and thereby a special 
class is formed, the capitalists. These are marked off from 
the wage-earners whom they employ in their large and 
enlarging industrial enterprises. Now the economical advan- 
tages of large capital engaged in extensive and systematic 
industry are obvious, yet just because of the greater uni- 
formity, abundance and cheapness of its products, the ability 
of the small free crafts to subsist is curtailed, which reduces 
the larger portion of the community to the position of wage- 
earners under the mastership of the capitalists, on whom 
their livelihood depends. The evils of this division of soci- 
ety, and of this enforced relation, have become familiar in 
what are known as labor troubles. The grasping selfishness 
of moneyed power induces oppression; and the sense of 
injustice, and the dissatisfaction with the unequal distribution 
of the amenities of life, induce violent revolt. 

Certain remedial schemes, under the generic name of 
socialism, have attained notoriety and many advocates. They 
propose a reorganization of society, giving it a more definite 
and compact solidarity. In general, they would abolish com- 
petition in labor, wages, and particular or private ownership 
of property, especially of land ; substituting work under the 
stimulus of public spirit, an equal distribution of products, 



154 ORGANIZATION 

and a common ownership and disposition of all fixed property 
by closely organized society. A still more radical scheme of 
reorganization, called communism, proposes to abolish also 
the family, substituting for domestic relations and the gov- 
ernment of parental authority, temporary unions, and a com- 
munistic care for the nurture and education of offspring. 
Attempts to maintain such schemes in practical operation 
have hitherto failed. 

A discussion of socialism as to its economical value, and 
even as to its ethical worth, must be passed by with the gen- 
eral remark that the evils of society as actually constituted 
arise, not from contrived injustice, but from a lack of moral 
equipoise. In the ideal community, which moral culture 
seeks to attain, there would be no tolerated trespass upon 
the rights of even the humblest member ; and in the absence 
of just cause of revolt, all would be content in the station 
determined by merit, by the relative value of services. Until 
this Utopia be realized, a more intelligent apprehension of the 
inseparable interests of capital and labor would conduce to 
greater harmony, to mutual respect, and to a wider recogni- 
tion of reciprocal rights. Meantime, remedy against oppres- 
sion by either party should be sought, not in turbulence and 
disorder, but in appeal to that which is set for the guardian- 
ship of rights, to the strong arm of the State. 



THE STATE 155 



CHAPTER IV 

THE STATE 

§ 112. It is essential to any widely associated life of men 
that there should be definite and effective provision for the 
protection of rights. For in every community evil-doers, or 
at least doers disposed to trespass, are so many, active and 
strong, that its several members are not competent, without 
combination, to maintain intact their rightful liberties. 
Moreover, certain important interests of the total community 
are best served by concerted action, indeed many cannot 
otherwise be served. To attain these two general ends, the 
safeguard of rights and the advancement of the common weal, 
the one protecting, the other promoting, is the purpose of 
the State. 

The established State occupies a definite territory. It em- 
braces several, perhaps many distinguishable communities, 
usually of one race and language, having common manners, 
customs and traditions. It consists primarily of the whole 
body of people, the body politic, including all officers of gov- 
ernment ; but the term is often, secondarily, limited to the 
official class, the sovereign body having supreme power held 
in trust for the common weal, which class, however, is more 
properly termed the government. 

It is not within the scope of this treatise to discuss the 
relative merits of different forms of state government, nor to 
trace the historical evolution of the State through the abuses, 
turmoils, and civil wars which, because of the imperfect or 
erroneous views and the selfish ambition of statesmen and 



156 ORGANIZATION 

rulers, have embarrassed its development. We shall attempt 
no more than to sketch the essential features of its constitu- 
tion, and to indicate its exclusively ethical basis, its thor- 
ough-going ethical character, and the varieties of moral 
obligation imposed on its members by its specific and peculiar 
organization. 

§ 113. Governments are distinguished as monarchic, aris- 
tocratic or republican, and democratic. Some combine ele- 
ments of each of these principal forms; as, Great Britain. 
No exclusive preference can be given to any one form. That 
is best which best accords with the historical traditions and 
habits of its subjects, is suitable to their grade of intellectual 
and ethical culture, and is administered in the interest of the 
public rather than of the rulers. 

Every well-ordered State, whatever be its form of govern- 
ment, has essentially a Constitution, unwritten or written, 
positively decreed, and loyally observed by its officials and 
citizens. The Constitution is the fundamental organic law, 
organizing the body politic. It has three essential features 
arising from the very nature of the State, the legislative, the 
judicial, the executive. The functions of the three are some- 
times embodied in one person ; as, an absolute monarch. In 
many cases they are irregularly distributed to a number of 
persons ; but the historical trend is clearly to separate them 
as distinct departments intrusted to a distinct personnel ; as, 
in each of the States of our Union, and in the Federal whole. 

The function of the Legislature is to enact statutory laws 
within the limits and in pursuance of the organic law, the 
Constitution. As a necessary corollary it has authority to 
affix penalties to these laws to insure their observance, and 
power to lay and collect taxes for the support of the govern- 
ment, and for the execution of its measures. 

The function of the Judiciary is to sit in judgment on the 



THE STATE 157 

constitutionality of the legislated statutes, to interpret their 
application, to sanction and decree the penalty for violation. 
When not otherwise directed by statute, the inferior courts 
proceed in accord either with the Roman or Civil Law, as in 
the States of continental Europe, or with the English Com- 
mon Law, which has been adopted as the basis of jural rights 
in the United States. 

The function of the Executive is to enforce the laws and 
carry out the measures enacted by the Legislature. The 
execution of laws respecting crime, and of those respecting 
property rights, is intrusted to the inferior courts with their 
police and prison auxiliaries, backed by the superior courts, 
and by the chief executive, be he governor, or president, or 
king. Measures for the public weal, as the coinage of money, 
the care and disbursement of the public funds, the system of 
public education, the postal system, the improvement of har- 
bors and waterways, the making of treaties, and many others, 
are carried into effect by this branch of the government. 
Also the chief executive is commander in chief of the army 
and navy, wherewith to insure domestic tranquillity, and the 
common defense against foreign aggression, invasion, or other 
form of trespass. 

§ 114. Now be it observed that the State is a complete, 
authoritative and powerful organization. Its foundation is 
on human rights, its superstructure is a fortress against tres- 
pass, a lodgment of justice, an abode of public duty and 
patriotic service. The structure is not new ; for the human 
race, so long as it has existed, has been busied in building, 
remodeling, repairing, improving, and maintaining in differ- 
ent forms, through all the vicissitudes of history, this emi- 
nently ethical institution. 

Recalling the definition of an organism, that each member 
is at once means and end for every other, and the whole for 



158 ORGANIZATION 

each and each for the whole, we observe: first, that each 
citizen in his action as such, as in voting, or paying a tax, or 
serving on a jury or in the army, and likewise each officer of 
any department in exercising his special function, is thereby 
expending energy as a means for the profit, directly or re- 
motely, of every other individual member of the State ; sec- 
ondly, that in so far as each member is profited thereby, he is 
an end ; thirdly, that the whole as a systematized means finds 
its end in guarding and promoting the liberty, privileges, 
rights and property of each individual member separately 
taken; and fourthly, that it is the function of each officer 
and citizen to become a means whereby to maintain the integ- 
rity and efficiency of the State in all its departments as an 
end. In ancient times this last relation was emphasized, the 
people are for the State ; as in the Roman Constitution, and 
in the Spartan Constitution so greatly admired by Aristotle. 
In modern times the reverse relation is emphasized, the State 
is for the people ; as in the Virginia Bill of Rights, which 
has been generally accepted as their Magna Charta by the 
United States. The right relation, however, between the 
governing and the governed is one of constant reciprocity. 
The mutual obligations are dissimilar, but in delicate and 
admirable equipoise. 

Moreover, in observing that the ends in every view are 
the preventing of trespass and the promoting of welfare, it 
is evident that the raison d'etre of the organization, and its 
informing element is strictly ethical. It would be easy to 
treat in detail of the duties of citizens to the State, and of 
the duties of the State to citizens, showing them to be 
strictly and exclusively moral obligations of high order, all 
coming under die law of trespass as prohibitions or as 
requisitions ; and it is well worth repeating that all laws of 
civil government are amplifications and specifications of the 
law of trespass. The Legislature originates no law abso- 



THE STATE 159 

lutely. Haying discovered certain rights unguarded or in 
abeyance, it is obligated to enact specific laws to meet the 
specific cases; and these laws derive their authority ulti- 
mately, not from the enacting body, nor from the whole 
people whom it represents, but from the fundamental impera- 
tive principle of right and justice, the moral law. 

§ 115. Mention has already been made of the strong 
tendency in recent days to individualism, of the disposition 
to lay stress upon the individual personality of each man 
and woman, slighting the unity of society in favor of its 
disparate plurality. It is evidently a reaction against the 
centralizing tendency of former times, which regarded the 
State as comprised in one man, or in one set of men, and all 
others as fused to a mass whose sole relation to the state 
was subservience. Both views are exaggerations, between 
which lies the truth. Both violate the organic character of 
the State, the latter excessively integrating, the former dis- 
integrating. 

Against individualism we point out that the State is not 
an aggregate of men and women, nor are individual men 
and women its originating units. The unit of the State is 
the family. As a city is composed of houses, so is a State 
of homes. The representative head of a family judges and 
acts for it in uniting with others to organize, or in the far 
more usual case, to conduct the affairs of the already organ- 
ized State. To him alone is properly committed the right of 
suffrage, as the one best capable of guarding and promoting 
all interests outside the domestic sphere. It has been wisely 
said that the two pillars upon which the whole structure of 
the State reposes, are the sanctity of the family relations 
and of the judicial oath. Should a blind Samson bow 
himself on these, the whole edifice would fall with disaster 
to ruins. 



160 ORGANIZATION 

The State is thus constituted primarily of a congeries of 
families organized into the larger whole. But beside these 
are many other organizations holding membership in the 
State, to whom protection is due ; as, business firms, stock 
companies, and corporations generally, including incorporated 
towns and cities. These are endowed by the State with 
large powers, and thus become subordinate municipalities, 
each imperium in imperio. Also each department of the 
State, and each of its subdivisions, as a court, an army, is 
itself a subsidiary organism. 

§ 116. The State as an organized whole, while distin- 
guished by special characteristics, has features resembling 
those of its elementary and subsidiary members. It is logi- 
cally indivisible in itself, an individual. Its subdivisions are 
not kinds, but departments, into which it is logically severed. 
As a self-subsisting individual, it has a life whose beginning 
is sometimes out of sight in remote antiquity, as that of 
Greece ; and whose continuity does not depend on that of 
its several members. We are born into it, we live within it, 
we die out from it ; we are but its transient accidents. A 
man looks forward to his end, and makes provision for it by 
testament ; a State, looking forward with expectation of in- 
definite continuity, makes no provision for an end. 

Moreover, a State is a personality. It has an intelligence 
and a culture of its own, and it has a will of its own. Also 
it has a conscience of its own. Often it incurs debt, and 
with unconstrained honesty meets its obligation. If it fail, 
it is dishonored and disgraced before the world, and causes 
guilty shame in every citizen, though he himself be blame- 
less. Sometimes States commit crime as States, and are 
punished by other States, or by ordinary providence. Usu- 
ally they are very jealous of national honor, and an offense 
arouses national indignation. 



THE STATE 161 

Also this distinct individual personality is manifest in the 
familiar recognition of national calamities, national pros- 
perity, national blessing, and national thanksgiving ; all these 
being clearly distinguished from what befalls this and that 
man, or this and that family. Withal there is a national 
character, as seen by contrast of the English, French, and 
Spanish peoples, more or less common to the individual 
citizens, but attributed to the nationality rather than to the 
man. It is only in a clear recognition of the distinct and 
unique personality of the State that a full and correct con- 
ception can be had of civic interest, of common welfare, and 
of public obligation. 

§ 117. Let us here give a passing glance at the great vari- 
ety of duties devolving upon a man because of his member- 
ship in a variety of organizations, each involving a special 
class or series of obligations. First as a member of a family, 
whose name he bears, he has peculiar obligations to each of 
the other members and to the whole. Then as a member of 
polite society, as a business man in the market, on change or 
in professional relations, as one of a club, or company, or as- 
sociation, or church, he enters into many varied relations; 
and, since obligation is founded on relation, these many varied 
relations determine, not only a multiplication but also a diver- 
sity, in kind and degree, of obligations. No man compre- 
hends life until he is made to see by how many organic fila- 
ments he is bound to his fellows ; how utterly impossible it 
is for him to separate his interests and his fortunes from 
theirs ; in how many ways the welfare of those who are 
round about him depends upon the working, in due manner 
and measure, of that part of the organism which he occupies. 

With membership in the State, whether as a citizen sim- 
ply or as an official also, arises another distinct series of obli- 
gations, often of a very exacting and absorbing character. 



162 ORGANIZATION 

Upon the sincere discharge of these by rulers and subjects 
depend the health and strength, the wholesome welfare, of 
the body politic. No merely perfunctory conduct, no dis- 
play of avowed patriotism, can replace genuine civic virtue. 
It is sorrowful to observe that public duties are ordinarily 
performed from dread of penalty or hope of reward, or per- 
haps from the higher motive of respect for the law. But in 
extraordinary junctures, in crises, in war, the service ren- 
dered, even when enforced, is often loving service, the com- 
pulsory is lost in the voluntary, and the dormant good-will 
of the people arouses to free and devoted exercise. This 
loving service of the State is the noble affection of true 
patriotism. 

§ 118. What is the justification of legal punishment? 
What is the ground on which rests the acknowledged right 
of society organized as a State to deprive a member offend- 
ing against its laws of his property, his liberty, his life? 
What is the warrant ? This grave question has been vari- 
ously answered. It is the right of the stronger, the com- 
bined force of many against one, the right of might, say 
some. It is the right of vengeance, of revenge for injury, 
transferred from the sufferer to the more capable and effect- 
ive State, say others. Yet others say, in lofty words, the 
dignity and authority of the law must be vindicated; the 
broken law must have its integrity restored, must be made 
whole again, rendered holy, sanctified, reconsecrated in the 
eyes of all before whom it has been violated, and this is the 
end of penalty. Let us seek firmer ground, some more 
rational justification. 

At the beginning of this treatise it was pointed out as a 
familiar fact in history that men are exceedingly tenacious of 
their rights, defending their claims with great pertinacity. 
This is obviously the ultimate explanation of most quarrels 



THE STATE 163 

between individual men, of suits and prosecutions before the 
courts, of contests between states or nations leading to inter- 
necine wars. Evidently by the common judgment of men 
every one has a right to defend a right. 

This judgment is clearly correct. For, if we once more 
fix discriminating attention on the primary, necessary, and 
universal notion of a right, we discern, implied in its exclu- 
sive ownership, this addendum to the original conception, a 
right to defend a right. Whatever possession is truly my 
own, I may retain and use, I may protect it from all damage, 
especially from trespass, I have a right, indeed am bound, to 
defend it against all comers. Evidently the right and obli- 
gation to defend my right is an essential implication in the 
demand for maintenance of moral order. Again, of my pos- 
sessions I am steward and guardian, they are trusts. A 
neglect to conserve and defend, within limits, a trust, is an 
indirect trespass upon all who have a claim upon me for its 
keeping and using. An attempted or threatened trespass 
upon my life, liberty or property, is to be resisted, else I my- 
self become a trespasser. Thus defense is not a mere con- 
tingent privilege, but a necessary obligation. 

Further, the obligation to defend a right implies a recipro- 
cal loss of right in the aggressor. By becoming a trespasser 
he forfeits in some corresponding degree his right to liberty, 
in extreme cases even to life. One attempting assassination, 
or arson, or burglary, is killed, if this be the only preventive 
means, by his intended victim, with regret, with sorrow in- 
deed, but without compunction. In the right of defense lies 
the warrant for interference in the liberty of a trespasser, 
which interference is not, therefore, itself a trespass. 

§ 119. In an unrestrained intercourse of men, with their 
various abilities physical and mental, and with the varied 
opportunities afforded by wealth and station, the stronger 



164 OR GANIZA TION 

trespass upon the weaker. An oppressor may perhaps con- 
sole himself with the brute maxim that might makes right, 
but the oppressed is not thereby relieved and quieted. Be- 
sides, impelled by selfish interests, men combine in couples, 
or squads, or large bands, and thus accumulate force to over- 
come the weaker. To inhibit such predicament society is 
organized into a State, constituted by a combining majority ; 
which organization is not oppressive but rather protective of 
the minority, the organic law becoming its shield, a defensive 
weapon, against popular caprice. The body politic employs 
agents, empowered by general consensus, to frame, apply 
and enforce particular laws in accord with the general pur- 
pose. 

To accomplish the chief end of its existence, the protec- 
tion of its subjects in their rightful liberty, the government 
must, as far as practicable, defend, both at large and in de- 
tail, the original and acquired rights of individual men, of 
trade firms, of legalized corporations, of all subordinate com- 
binations of its citizens for legitimate purposes ; the right of 
private defense being transferred, except in emergency, to 
the more potent and equable agency. In order to fulfill this 
great trust, the government must defend itself. Its officers 
must be protected in the discharge of their legitimate func- 
tions against violence or intimidation. It must prevent the 
high crimes of regicide and treason, must resist the insurrec- 
tion of a disaffected minority, or the aggression of a foreign 
power. As an individual personality it is bound to preserve 
its integrity and efficiency by vigorous self-defense. It is 
clear that a State, as a faithful trustee, is bound, first, to pre- 
serve its own existence, and secondly, to restrain, to resist, 
and, if need be, to destroy whatsoever and whomsoever 
assails its authority or attacks the interests committed to its 
charge. Self-preservation, and the preservation of all that 
is intrusted to it, are moral obligations of every State. 



THE STATE 165 

§ .120. Therein is the ultimate ground that justifies legal 
punishment. It is discovered in the obligation to exert pro- 
tective defense of rights. All legal penalties are set for the 
defense of rights. They inflict pain on the law-breaker, are 
a painful interference in his liberty, warranted by the prin- 
ciple of defense. They deter him from repetition of the 
offense, and they deter observers from like misconduct, thus 
defending the rights involved. Practically imperfect as it is, 
no other means is known by which to effect defense against 
offense, except this of inflicting pain on offenders in propor- 
tion to the gravity of their misdeeds. The punishment, as to 
kind and degree, is determined by what is past and cannot 
be reinstated ; its purpose is to determine what is future, and 
is deterrent, preventive of further or like trespass. Thus the 
sufficient, rational, and only righteous ground of legal penalty 
is the protective defense of rights. 

The principle applies to the divine government of the 
world. The natural sanctions of universal moral law are the 
typical antecedents of the artificial sanctions of civil law, 
and go far in an explanation of the righteousness of pain. 
The sovereign Deity has rights on which men trespass as 
well as on the rights of his subjects. He defends these and 
his authority by the appointed natural pains attending dis- 
order, and by special penalties affixed to special offenses. 
Sin is essentially trespass on Deity, and the punishment of 
sin is self-defense, and the defense of all under his protec- 
tion. To have any other gods before him is high treason. 

Deterrent defense is disciplinary. This gives title to 
houses of correction or reformatories set especially for re- 
claiming youthful offenders, and to penitentiaries where felons 
do penance, rendering them penitent, leading to reformation. 
So imprisonment generally, and also fines are disciplinary, 
not only of the offender, but of the observer, and even capi- 
tal punishment has this salutary effect on society. Thus the 



166 ORGANIZATION 

law is a schoolmaster, a pedagogue, leading to higher life. 
But this, with the State, is not its original, nor its avowed, 
nor indeed its ultimate purpose, but is an accessory. The 
State is not an educational, but a protective institution, and 
reformation is not the end, but a means of preventing tres- 
pass. Its enacted sanctions, among which are no rewards, 
are not incentive, but deterrent. Indeed, in the last analysis, 
any and every warranted interference in liberty is a defense 
against trespass, or, no interference in a person's liberty has 
ever a warrant save in defense against trespass. In the 
domestic sphere parents punish to chasten. Chastisement is 
punishment intended to benefit the sufferer. It is often and 
rightly inflicted with no wider or further view ; but this whip 
of love means more, and the chastening has its only complete 
justification in forestalling the trespasses of perhaps a remote 
future. Our Father, in the abundance of his love, chastens 
his children, not only that the erring may turn and live, but 
more largely that all who might suffer from the persisting 
error may be spared the harm, and loss, and sorrow. 

§ 121. The right of a government to suppress mob turbu- 
lence or riots of any kind, is obviously the right and duty to 
defend domestic tranquillity; and to quell an insurrection 
against magisterial authority, is clearly to exercise the right 
and duty of self-defense. The inverse right of revolution 
has the same basis. The ends of the State being the defense 
of rights and the promotion of the common welfare, " when 
any government shall be found inadequate or contrary to 
these purposes, a majority of the community hath an indu- 
bitable, inalienable, and indefeasible right to reform, alter, or 
abolish it, in such manner as shall be judged most conducive 
to the public weal." Evidently, if a government be con- 
tinuously oppressive to the body of the people, their original 
and sacred right of self-defense justifies them in subverting 
it, and substituting one that promises better things. 



THE STATE 167 

War has no other justification. A war of conquest is 
plainly the crimes of murder, arson, robbery, and the rest of 
the foul catalogue, many times multiplied. On the other 
hand, a defensive war, provided all other honorable means of 
rectification have failed, is thoroughly righteous. That a 
State repel vi et armis the encroachment, the aggression, the 
trespass of another, is a moral obligation of highest order. 
A brave and conscientious people, possessing civic rights 
inherited to be fostered and transmitted, maintains them, 
even against overwhelming numbers and resources, and does 
not surrender, but dies in defending its trusts, warring until 
resistance becomes madness. Defense may fire the first gun, 
may invade the enemy's territory, may sweep his commerce 
from the sea, thus to conquer immunity and peace ; but, to 
be justified, all proceedings must originally and continuously 
be intentional and essential defense. This is so clearly recog- 
nized by civilized States in modern times that, whenever war 
between them occurs, each party loudly claims to be acting 
on the defensive, thus seeking to justify its action in its own 
eyes, and in the eyes of the rest of mankind. 

§ 122. Geographic, climatic, and other conditions deter- 
mine that there shall be many States. Differences of race, 
language, religion, tradition, the genius and general culture 
of the people, further determine different forms of governs 
ment, as monarchies, republics, democracies. These, the 
world over, have both common and conflicting interests, and 
are otherwise more or less intimately related. Their relations 
are adjusted by resident ambassadors and consuls, and by 
occasional diplomatic correspondence, forming and perform- 
ing treaties of commerce, and of alliance, fixing boundaries, 
and regulating minor matters. The trend of civilization has 
long been towards a brotherhood of peoples, and the enter- 
prise of the nineteenth century has so vastly increased the 



168 ORGANIZATION 

facilities of intercommunication, by multiplying roads of 
rapid transit, by tunneling Alpine barriers, by devising a 
swift and safe crossing of seas, by weaving over the globe 
a network of electric wires and submarine cables, that civic 
isolation has now almost entirely disappeared, and the na- 
tions are fusing and welding together. This intimate inter- 
course and manifold relation is subject to the one universal 
moral law of trespass not. There is no other obligation in 
all the comity of nations. 

The increasing intimacy of these civic relations brings 
clearly into view the organic unity of mankind, and suggests 
the conception of a universal State, whose mighty function 
shall be to secure international justice without war. This 
ideal is becoming in a measure realized. " Its realization," 
says Dr. Seelye, "does not require, indeed, in the actual 
condition of men, would not permit that all particular States 
should lose their individuality of government or institutions, 
and be merged in what might be deemed the visible embodi- 
ment of the one universal State. The universal State has no 
visible embodiment. Yet it is not thereby without reality or 
power. In our modern world nothing has shown itself more 
real or potent. What we call international law, or the law 
of nations, unknown except in the vaguest, faintest way in 
ancient times, is recognized in our day as a sovereignty in 
human affairs, equally majestic and mighty. It has no visible 
throne ; it does not utter itself through the voice of a mon- 
arch, or the votes of a legislature or people ; it has no courts 
to expound, nor any fleets or armies to enforce its dictates ; 
but it guides kings, and legislatures, and peoples, and courts, 
and fleets, and armies in our times, with an authority whose 
manifestation of power is steadily increasing. There is 
nothing so characteristic of modern politics as the sway which 
international law, a development of the one moral law, is 
continually gaining among existing nations. There is no 



THE STATE 169 

other point in which the politics of the present day are 
so clearly distinct from those of the ancient world. But 
international law is nothing other than the voice of the one 
universal State. It is the State in the highest exhibition of 
it yet given in history." The State thus organizing is a 
whole, is one and indivisible, uniting through itself more and 
more manifestly its constituent organizations, without effa- 
cing their distinct individuality, and presenting to the vision 
of political philosophy a world of united States. 



170 ORGANIZATION 



CHAPTER V 

THE CHUKCH 

§ 123. Religion, in its widest sense, viewed subjectively, 
is belief in presiding, superhuman, spiritual power, earnest 
enough to influence moral character and conduct; viewed 
objectively it is a body of doctrine relative to such power, 
instructing and regulating its votaries. Religion is of two 
kinds, natural and revealed ; the former relying for its be- 
lief and doctrine on reason alone ; the latter claiming to 
have in addition information communicated by the higher 
power. 

The negative member of this dichotomy is natural reli- 
gion. Under scientific treatment it is entitled natural theol- 
ogy. It proceeds independently of historical, racial and 
local influences, discarding the dogmas of tradition, author- 
ity and custom, and upon rational grounds investigates the 
evidence furnished by nature of the reality and character of 
a higher power. More particularly, it seeks proof of the 
existence of God, his unity and personality, the kind and 
degree of his attributes, his will concerning us, the distinc- 
tion between right and wrong, good and evil, our relation 
and obligation to him, and our destiny both here and here- 
after. 

Revealed religions, which Diderot calls the heresies of 
natural religion, seek in general to impose their systems far 
less by reason than by persuasion with appeal to emotion 
and passion. Historically they have been largely character- 
ized by superstition or extreme reverence and fear of what is 
unknown or mysterious, and by fanaticism or ignorant, irra- 



THE CHURCH 171 

tional worship of deities, with excessive rigor in opinions 
and practice. Witness the prevailing Asiatic and African 
cults. Christianity, however, is a revealed religion claiming 
to be in entire accord with natural religion, to be at its basis 
strictly rational, and to demand no more of its adherents 
than a reasonable faith in its transcendent doctrine. 

§ 124. It has already been pointed out that a theory of 
Ethics to be complete as to its system must include the rec- 
ognition of a personal God, and of man's relation to him, and 
consequent obligation to render him loving service. This 
does not mean that there may not be practical morality even 
of very high grade in the various relations among men, with- 
out religion, without any acknowledgment of God; but it 
means that a scheme of morality without God is necessarily 
incomplete, has no ultimate support, no philosophic unity, 
and cannot be expanded into a scientifically systematized 
theory. Herein it appears that natural religion is the cap- 
stone, or rather the keystone, of Ethics. 

Oriental scholars testify that Confucianism is simply and 
solely a body of inconsistent, ill assorted and often erroneous 
ethical doctrines, that Buddhism, the confession of one-third 
of the human race, is little else, and that both are distinctly 
atheistic. Hinduism is pantheism, and pantheism, whether 
taught by the Brahman or by the god-intoxicated Spinoza, or 
by the haughty Hegelian, is merely a refined and enlarged, a 
generalized feticism. It denies the intelligence and freedom, 
the personality of its god. Now, since ethics with its com- 
plement religion is grounded in and arises from relations 
among persons, an impersonal being can have no part therein. 
Man cannot trespass on the world of nature, on the moun- 
tains, the continents, the ocean, or the stars, but only on 
him who intelligently and freely produced them, and to 
whom therefore they belong. The impersonal, so-called god 



172 OR GANIZA TION 

of the pantheist is not at all the God of the ethical and reli- 
gious philosopher. Pantheism is essentially atheism. 

The mythical polytheistic cult of the ancient Greeks, in 
form adopted by the skeptical Romans, and by them diffused 
over the Empire, was doubtless originally a deified personifi- 
cation of natural objects and forces, and an apotheosis of 
heroes. It was replaced in the philosophic thought of An- 
axagoras and of his successors by a strict monotheism, shin- 
ing forth clearly in the famous hymn of Cleanthes. Thus 
unaided philosophy early reached and taught esoterically a 
remarkably pure natural religion, which, though it seems not 
to have taken practical form, nevertheless gave to the ethics 
of the Stoics a coherence, a consistency, an ultimatum and 
completeness that secured its permanence and general accep- 
tance even to this day. 

All religions, and even atheistic cults, come within the 
scope of Ethics. We have already seen that a man is re- 
sponsible for his beliefs. Every belief relating to conduct, 
be its subject true or false, carries with it obligations, duties ; 
for every one is bound, whatever be its error, to conform his 
conduct to the results of his moral judgment, or, as it is com- 
monly expressed, is bound to obey his conscience. In reli- 
gion it is not otherwise. Ethical principles prevail within 
the shrine. They are immutable and all pervading. They 
are the ground not only from which natural religion arises, 
but on which revealed religion descending must take its 
stand to find a firm support. 

Shall an exception be made in favor of Christianity? Not 
at all. Christianity is preeminently ethical. Indeed in a 
philosophic view its great strength lies in the exact conform- 
ity of its teaching to the universal and eternal ethical princi- 
ples which it enlightens, widens, exalts and refines. It came 
not to destroy but to fulfill the law more enduring than 
heaven and earth. The Sermon on the Mount speaks of the 



THE CHURCH 173 

Kingdom of heaven and of the fatherhood of God, but it con- 
tains no distinctively Christian doctrine, and is occupied 
otherwise with applications of purely ethical principles. It 
might fairly be entitled a Lecture on Practical Ethics. 
These principles determine what is due in domestic, in social, 
and in civic order, and are likewise fundamental in religious 
order. Hence it is that so much is discovered to be common 
to all those religions, both natural and revealed, that have 
attained to the dignity of a system. 

§ 125. In general it is true that wherever cults develop, 
even those full of superstition, there arises a priesthood pro- 
fessing the function of mediator to propitiate the super- 
human power. The priesthood becomes organized, and 
unites with the State, seeking its protection, using its au- 
thority, and lending in turn its potent influence to strengthen 
the secular government. So it has been with the Christian 
Church, an organization that prevails to-day throughout 
Europe and America. To it we will now give special 
attention. 

In the Christian Church we find a purified and exalted 
ethical doctrine, including natural religion, supplemented and 
complemented by revelation. Christianity is differentiated 
from other religions by the teaching that Jesus of Nazareth 
is the Christ, the incarnate Son of God, making atonement by 
the cross, and ever living as Savior and King. It is this 
differentia only that Christian polemics has to defend against 
infidelity. Its expansion constitutes Christology. With 
this a treatise on Ethics has nothing to do ; it is concerned 
only with the generic elements expanded into natural religion. 

For, all the great virtues that stand out as cardinal have 
had existence among all peoples from the beginning. The 
decalogue, excepting perhaps the sabbath-day law, contains 
nothing new. All moral obligations binding men to God 



174 ORGANIZATION 

and to each other originate, not in legislation, but in the 
nature which God gave to man, and are determined in detail 
by the variations in his complex relations. The virtues have 
been developing through all the ages among all peoples, and 
are developing to-day under a better understanding, a fuller 
comprehension, a more subservient recognition of personal 
relations and their consequent obligations. No doubt Chris- 
tianity has been and still is powerfully influential in their 
higher development, giving brighter light over a widening 
horizon ; but Christianity did not originate them, it merely 
found them, enlarged them, enlightened them. Manifestly, 
the all-informing, all-embracing, fundamental law of Chris- 
tian activity, is the ethical, altruistic law of loving service. 

§ 126. Historically the Christian Church emerged from 
Judaism very weak in numbers, and in social influence. Its 
organization, comparable to a shepherd with his flock, was 
extremely simple and apparently feeble. But its native 
strength was soon manifested. The original hundred and 
twenty speedily became as many thousands. Local churches 
were multiplied. The "heresy" was propagated with an 
activity, energy and devoted zeal that knew no bounds. It 
spread into Asia Minor, it invaded Europe, and entered 
Rome. The vast power of the State, then mistress of the 
civilized world, was put forth to suppress the rising « super- 
stition,' and in the course of three centuries ten fierce and 
bloody persecutions, extending throughout the Empire, and 
waged with all the implacable might of the Roman power, 
sought to crush it, and failed. Gathering new and greater 
strength from adversity, it successfully resisted the oppressor, 
conquered the conqueror, and shared the throne of the 
Caesars. 

This affiliation of the Church with the State, in the middle 
of the fourth century, together with an increasing complexity 



THE CHURCH 175 

and solidarity of organization, gave even greater efficiency to 
its propagandism. Apparently weakened by the schism into 
East and West, into Greek and Latin, it nevertheless with- 
stood the floods of barbarians that overwhelmed and over- 
threw the Empire, converted and snbdned them, saved 
Christianity for Europe, and ruled the continent throughout 
the mediaeval centuries. In modern times, beginning with 
the sixteenth century, a further division of the Western 
Church into Catholic and Protestant, with many subdivi- 
sions, has occurred, which seems to have stimulated rather 
than impaired its zealous activity. Thus during two millen- 
niums, amid the rise and fall of States and Empires, the 
Church has maintained its growing power, and to-day Chris- 
tendom embraces Europe and America, and is pressing its 
jurisdiction into Asia, Africa, and the isles of the sea. 

§ 127. What therein determines this unique persistence 
and expanding potency is not far to seek. First, there is an 
exalted, purified and extended morality, approving itself to 
the heart and conscience of humanity as in accord with its 
ideal constitution and the natural order of life among men, 
which morality is taught in precept and urged in practice. 
Secondly, there is an enlarged and enlightened view of our 
relation and obligation to God as Our Father, giving to 
natural religion a clearness and cogency never attained in 
the schools of philosophy. Thirdly, there is a well settled 
claim of a divine origin, of a divine founder in the person of 
Jesus of Nazareth, of a divine revelation promising redemp- 
tion to the faithful and eternal blessedness to the righteous. 
We would not ignore but heartily approve the further claim 
of the Church that it is multiplied, upheld and impelled by 
the immanent Spirit of God ; but, from a historic and philo- 
sophic point of view the aforementioned principles go far 
toward explaining the phenomenal strength and growth of 



176 ORGANIZATION 

this the most durable and comprehensive of all human 
organizations. 

Moreover, consider the ends for which the Church pro- 
poses itself as the means. It claims to have solved the 
problem of life, to interpret its meaning, and to offer sure 
guidance to the faithful. Maintaining that our terrestrial 
life is teleologically justified only by the fact that it is related 
to a higher life, to a life beyond, and therefore has import, 
not as an end in itself, but as a period of preparation and 
probation for eternal life, it proclaims to restless humanity : 
Come unto me, and find your promised rest. " We may con- 
cede that the teleology of history has never reached a system 
formally more complete than the philosophy of the Church. 
Heaven and eternal happiness the goal of historical life, the 
earth its temporal scene of action, its central point the incar- 
nation of God and the foundation of the Kingdom of heaven 
on earth, all past ages leading up to this culmination which 
shall determine the entire future, the whole course of history 
bounded by the day of creation on the one hand and the day 
of judgment on the other, these indeed constitute such a 
grand philosophy of history that Hegel's or Comte's barren 
abstractions are mere nothing when compared with the fruits 
fill, concrete conception." Under the shield of this massive 
doctrine, and by right of its divine ordination, the Church is 
claiming ownership and actively seeking possession of the 
whole world in the name of its living King. 

§ 128. In the fourth century the Church was incorporated 
with the State. It is generally admitted by ecclesiastical his- 
torians that, from and after the time of Constantine, the ori- 
ginal constitution of the Church was overlaid by a vast body 
of human additions, particularly by the hierarchy, assimilating 
the magistracy by a long gradation of ecclesiastical dignities 
or powers, rising upward from the primitive pastor or curate 






THE CHURCH 177 

to the bishop, to the pope or patriarch; and that by these 
and other results of the alliance of the Church with the 
Empire, its simplicity was lost, its purity corrupted, and the 
prior relations of the clergy and laity injuriously affected. 
Yet "it was of immense advantage to European civilization 
that a moral influence, a moral power, a power resting entirely 
upon moral convictions, upon moral opinions and sentiments, 
should have established itself in society, just at the period 
when it seemed on the point of being crushed by an over- 
whelming physical force. Had not the thoroughly organized 
Church at this time existed, the whole world must have 
fallen a prey to mere brute power. It alone possessed a 
moral power; it maintained and promulgated the idea of 
a precept, of a law superior to all human authority ; it pro- 
claimed that great truth which forms the only foundation of 
our hope for humanity, namely, that there exists a law above 
all human law, which, by whatever name it be called, whether 
reason, or the law of God, or what not, is, at all times and in 
all places, eternally one and the same." 

In the course of the centuries, however, the alliance of the 
Church with the State proved unwholesome. An arrogant 
and ambitious clergy endeavored to render its rule entirely 
independent of the people, to bring them under authority, to 
take possession of their mind and life without the conviction 
of their reason or the consent of their will. Claiming to be 
in possession of the keys, it exercised a spiritual lordship of 
almost unbounded power. It endeavored with all its might 
to establish a theocracy, to usurp the temporal authority of 
the State, to establish universal dominion. The struggle for 
supremacy between the Church and the State, always at the 
expense of the liberties of the people, often resulted in the 
subjugation and subservience of the latter; and the former, 
asserting its catholicity, was for centuries the dominant power 
over Europe. Ecclesiastical dissension and division, in some 



178 ORGANIZATION 

States, broke this dominion, but the ill-starred communion of 
the two organizations has persisted, an unholy alliance, con- 
fusing the sacred with the secular to the prejudice of both. 1 

The end, the ultimate purpose for which the State exists, 
and that for which the Church exists, are quite distinct, and 
their rightful means of attaining their ends have little in 
common. The proper function of the State is concerned with 
the material prosperity, the external wealth of its citizens ; 
the proper function of the Church is concerned with the 
spiritual prosperity, the internal weal of its clergy and laity. 
The one seeks to protect and promote the health and wealth 
of the body politic ; the other to edify and multiply its adhe- 
rents. Membership in the one is quite involuntary ; in the 
other it is essentially voluntary. The one upholds its au- 
thority by physical force; the other by moral force alone, 
having no penalties beyond censure and excommunication. 
The State has sharply marked geographical limits which it 
may not transgress ; the Church, expanding its realm, freely 
invades all other realms. The former is in no sense a propa- 
gandist ; the latter is essentially a missionary. In their union 
the lines of demarcation become obscured, and each under- 
takes more or less the office of the other, leading to a strug- 
gle for mastery and a consequent hinderance of efficiency. 
Christendom has greatly suffered, and is still suffering from 
this error. And not without warning. For, at the very 
origin of the Church, their prospective divorce, their separate 
functions, their distinct work and harmonious adjustment, 
were declared in the profoundly wise prescription of its 
founder : Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and 
unto God the things that are God's. 1 

§ 129. A local church politically free, and constituted 
simply of a pastor, deacons and lay members, is strictly and 
distinctly an organism. Very generally, local churches come 



THE CHURCH 179 

into organic union with each other, constituting synods, con- 
ferences, councils. These again organize into yet more com- 
prehensive ecclesias or general assemblies, officered by a 
hierarchy of priests, bishops, and other clergy, whose consti- 
tutional functions are formally defined. All the various 
groups of church organization, of various denomination, not- 
withstanding their differences and dissensions, are furthermore 
in reality organized into a holy Church universal, one truly 
catholic, by their common acceptance of the New Testament 
as organic and ultimate law, interpreted, and in some cases 
modified, as in the Church of Rome, by ecclesiastical au- 
thority. In the universal and intensely active Christian 
Church, with its many subsidiary organizations, their officers 
and members, we discover the most extensive, complete and 
powerful organism ever known, and one which is rapidly 
realizing the ancient dream of universal empire in an organic 
unification of mankind. 

From the varied relations obtaining in this Christian body, 
wherein all are members one of another, arises a multiplicity 
of special obligations and active duties calling for a never 
flagging constancy and devotion, and heartily recognized as 
displacing by superior claim all conflicting calls. Each mem- 
ber confesses that he belongs to the Church, and does not 
hesitate to name this servitude as a sufficient reason for his 
special conduct. On the other hand, the Church belongs to 
him, serving to edify his spiritual worth. Moreover, it is a 
common brotherhood, a communion, a fellowship one with 
another, and with the divine head, all working together for 
nearness and likeness to God. These obligations ramify 
throughout every other class of duties, intensify and sanctify 
them. The Christian man among men, the Christian father, 
mother, son and daughter, the Christian member of the com- 
munity where his lot is cast, the Christian man of affairs, the 
Christian citizen and statesman, is more closely bound in 



180 ORGANIZATION 

each and all of these relations by virtue of his Christian con- 
fession, and finds therein new and higher, the highest motives 
for ordering all his conduct on the principles inculcated by 
the Christian Church. Thus this spiritual organism enters 
into, and exerts a dominant influence over, all the relations 
and obligations of our temporal life, while looking and pre- 
paring for the eternal life beyond. 

It has been pointed out that natural religion in its origin 
and perfection is ethics, also that the Christian religion is 
ethics extended, confirmed, refined. The revelation of God 
in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, expands obliga- 
tion heavenward, and widens its horizon to embrace all man- 
kind. The ethics of every day life, which is not itself 
distinctively Christian, finds its complement in the doctrines 
of the Church. The teachings of the Teacher have enlight- 
ened human reason, cleared the moral judgment, exalted the 
moral sentiments, purified motives, and subdued the will. 
The realm is enlarged, but it is the realm of ethics still, 
involving conscience, obligation, duty, gratitude, love. We 
found the moral law to be Thou shalt not trespass either by 
invasion of rights or by evasion of dues, having an equivalent 
in Be thou just, and in Thou shalt love and serve. Chris- 
tianity lays no other mandate. The loving service of God, 
and of his Christ, and of his creatures, a fellowship in mutual 
self-sacrifice, is its very essence ; and clear definitions of 
duty, pressing incentives to activity, and divinely ordained 
means of efficiency, are supplied by its organized Church. 



FINIS. 



IIN'DEX 



The number refers to the page. For general topics, see Table of Contents. 



Actions, the moral quality of, 55. 
Affection, the supremacy of, 81, 127. 
Alter ego, the fiction of, 75, 77. 
Altruism, the modified doctrine of, 79, 90. 
Argument against egoism, 81. 
Attention, the means of self-control, 57. 

Basis of ethics in human nature, 3, 9, 116. 
Beneficence, or beneficial service, 98. 
Benevolence, love, charity, defined, 95, 98. 

Choice and intention, 11, 12, 54. 

— incapable of coercion, 13. 
Christianity an expansion of ethics,172,180. 

— its persistence and potency, 175. 
Church, the universal, an organism, 178. 

— its solidarity, 179. 

— and state, union of, 174, 176. 

— their distinct functions, 178. 
Conscience defined, inerrant, 32. 

— discrimination of, 52. 
Cruelty defined, a trespass, 37. 
Cults, the heathen, 171. 

Culture, progress in moral, 46, 88, 99. 

Decalogue and the moral law, 38. 
Defense of personal honor, 28. 

— of all trusts obligatory, 92, 122. 

— assumed by the state, 164. 

— in form of legal punishment, 165. 
Definition of science, 1. 

— of ethics, 2, 70. 

— of trespass, 22. 

— of cruelty, 37. 

— of pleasure and pain, 48. 

— of justice, 63. 

— of jurisprudence, 65. 

— of virtue, 72. 

— of love, charity, benevolence, 95. 

— of welfare, 105. 

— of organism, 111, 121. 

— of religion, 170. 



Deity, a personal, postulated, 114, 171. 

— nature of, the ultimate ground, 117. 

— superior to obligation, 119. 
Desires, logical distribution of, 126. 
Disinterested action, 80. 

Division of labor, moral aspect of, 151. 
Divorce, ground of, 138. 
Duties to self, fictitious, 76. 

Equity corrective of legality, 67. 
Ethics defined, 2, 70. 

— basic principle of, 8, 21. 
Evolution of morals, 2, 103, 110, 116. 

Family, an individual personality, 124, 141. 

— the ideal, an organism, 135, 141. 

— the unit of the state, 159. 
Freedom defined, its limitations, 11. 

— and liberty discriminated, 14. 

— the condition of morality, 53, 57. 

Gambling, a trespass, 26. 
Good, relative and absolute, 109. 
Government, kinds and department of ,156. 

— ends of, 158. 

Happiness and welfare distinguished, 107. 
Heroism, its essence, 88. 
Honor, personal, 28. 
Humanitarian ethics, 113. 

Imperatives, hypothetical, categorical, 33. 
Didividualism, the tendency to, 150. 
Datention and attention, 12. 

— moral quality in, 55. 
Intuition of ethical principle, 4, 6, 8. 

— of the notion of a right, 19. 

— of the moral law, 31. 

Judgment, the moral, errant, 33, 52. 
Jurisprudence defined, 65. 
Justice defined, 63. 



181 



182 



INDEX 



Kant, on using another person, 90. 

— his scheme of morality rejected, 93. 
Knowledge for its own sake, 73, 79. 

Law, the moral, 31. 

— and penalty, sanctions of civil, 42, 46. 

— of retaliation in kind, 47. 

— positive forms of, 62, 64, 70, 87, 99. 

— of service, 87. 

— of love, the perfect, 99. 

Liberty and freedom discriminated, 14. 

— interference in, 14, 16, 21. 

— incompatible with law, 74. 

— perfected in love, 101. 
Limits of human ability, 13. 

Love of self, egoism, selfishness, 76. 

— or charity, benevolence, defined, 95. 

— may be and is commanded, 96. 

— kinds of, degrees of, 97. 

— the perfect law of, 99. 

— perfected, liberty perfected, 101. 

Marriage, the pointing of nature, 134. 

— its moral conditions, 136. 
Mercy and justice identified, 68. 
Merit and demerit, judgment of, 43. 
Method of this treatise, 4. 

Mind, its powers distributed, 7, 126. 
Minister, dignity of the title, 88. 
Moral law, negative form of, 31, 37. 

— categorical, supremacy of, 34. 

— objectivity of, 35. 

— positive forms of, 62, 64, 70, 85, 87, 99. 

— quality in intention, 55. 

— quality imputed, 58. 

— paradox, 60. 

— culture, progress in, 46, 88, 99. 

Normal and abnormal desires, 22. 

Organism defined, 111, 121, 157. 

Pain and pleasure, 48, 103. 

Person, perfect and imperfect, 114, 124. 

Personal relations condition rights, 20, 35. 

Positivism, the Comteists, 113, 116. 

Principle of ethics, 8, 21. 

Property, ground of, 24. 

— in family relations, 142. 

— inheritance of, 143. 
Punishment, various forms of, 47. 

— legal, its warrant, 162, 165. 



Reasons not causes, 15. 

Religion, definition and divisions of, 170. 

— heathen cults, 171. 

— Christian, differentiated, 173. 
Right and a right coextensive, 50. 

— and wrong, conscience, 52. 

— and duty coextensive, 70. 

— of revolution, 166. 
Rights prior to obligations, 3. 

— the notion of, pure and simple, 6, 19. 

— kinds of, reduced, 9. 

— conditioned on personal relations, 20, 35. 

— of property, 24. 

— moral and legal, 51. 

Sacrifice, implied in service, 88. 

— limitations of, 89. 
Science defined, 1. 
Scriptures, how used, 2. 

Self as an end, excluded, 77, 81. 

Sentiments, the moral, 42. 

Service, the law of, 87. 

Sin defined, a trespass, 30. 

Slander, a trespass, 26. 

Social intercourse, ends of, 147. 

Socialism, its moral aspects, 153. 

Solitary, destitute of rights, 20, 127, 130. 

State, an individual personality, 124, 160. 

— the unit of the, 159. 

— a universal, 168. 
Stewardship, the using of trusts, 92. 
Summum bonum, 109. 
Supernatural and superhuman, 115. 

Temperance, an altruistic virtue, 78. 
Trespass defined, 22. 

— indirect, by reservation, 29, 62, 122. 

— identified with injustice, 64. 
Trusts, all possessions are, 92, 122. 
Truthfulness, fundamental in society, 147 

Utilitarianism, kinds of, 110. 

Virtue defined, 72. 
Volition, its elements, 54. 

War, its sole justification, 167. 
"Warranted interference in liberty, 16. 
Welfare, defined, 105. 

— conditions of, 108. 

— attainment of, 111. 

Will, its freedom and limitations, 11. 
Will of God, not the ultimate ground, 117. 



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